


aperçus désagréables (disagreeable perceptions)

by rosaecae



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Bipolar Ian, College, Enemies to Lovers, Love Triangles, M/M, Musician Ian, Musician Mickey, New York City, Piano, Teacher-Student Relationship, i hate tagging things!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-13
Updated: 2017-08-15
Packaged: 2018-11-13 06:59:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 24,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11179491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosaecae/pseuds/rosaecae
Summary: Mickey is an arrogant junior in the piano program at Juilliard, working off his disciplinary action as a teacher's assistant. Ian, a prodigious improvisational pianist and freshman who is struggling with the classical aspect of his studies, is Mickey's ticket out of school-mandated probation.





	1. Prelude

**Author's Note:**

> something new! the whole thing is not going to be in this style, i just wanted a detailed exposition.  
> the title of the fic is the title of a series of duets by Erik Satie (and yes ik disagreeable perceptions is not the exact translation but that is what it is typically called in english idk)

When Mickey was six, he had his first music class. That didn’t mean much in a shitty Southside elementary school; just a bunch of little kids caterwauling along to public domain songs and calling out the names of instruments when the teacher pointed to pictures of them. 

By his third music class, though, the teacher seemed to have decided to actually buckle down and force some culture into their lives, whether they, as generally neglected 6 year olds, gave a shit or not.

An aging man with a rough-around-the-edges face, his eyes sparkled with the kindness necessary to teach children. Mickey remembers the way he smiled softly before he sat down behind that tilted piano the first time, as if maybe, he knew. He knew what he was about to do would reach at least  _ one  _ of the children in that room.

The man played like velvet. Like a summer day, or a rainstorm. He sat down, announced, “This is by a man named  _ Claude Debussy _ ,” and began a cascade of tone that shocked a tiny, quiet Mickey into enrapturement.

He didn’t know music could  _ sound  _ like that. His brothers only blasted angry sounding music, music that Mickey didn’t understand. His mother hummed off-key folk tunes, sometimes. When his father wasn’t around.

His father...Mickey wasn’t sure he knew what music even was.

The man, the teacher, must have known. Must have had some sixth sense.

At the next class, he played a piece by Chopin, something very mournful. Thick. A raw lament. Then, when he dismissed the class, he asked Mickey to stay behind, and inquired as to whether or not he would like to learn to play the piano.

“Don’t have money,” Mickey had informed him, regretfully. Even back then, he’d known who he was, what he could plausibly have in life, and why.

“But would you like to learn?” the teacher had asked again with a smile.

Of course he did. 

* * *

 

When Ian was six, his father was sober for the first time in his life. He had pulled Ian to the piano tucked against the wall eagerly and declared that he was going to teach his son to play. Ian, for the first time, felt like his dad actually wanted to be around him, so he had accepted without thought.

Frank had settled at the piano to start, to prove to Ian that he could play, and what flowed from his fingers made Ian’s hair stand on end with electricity. A watercolor of thought and occasional clashing tones entranced him. 

He didn’t know music could sound like that.

“Who made that song?” he had asked his father when the melody resolved.

His father had smiled triumphantly. “Me, son! You let me teach you, you can make songs, too.”

Frank gave him three lessons, then disappeared for three weeks.

Ian felt his heart shatter, and then harden, for the first time.

He kept playing, anyway.

* * *

 

The first few years of lessons were hell.

They always are, of course. Piano is the foundational instrument because it’s one of the hardest instruments to actually  _ play _ . Many people can sit down at a piano and press a few keys in a certain way and produce something like a melody, but to actually, really play it, to make  _ music _ , it’s larger than a tune.

It’s in your chest somewhere, Mickey thinks. A little blossom in your chest and your throat and your stomach that can buzz in your fingertips and make you light in the head and produce emotion through sound, if you let it.

The first few years of lessons were hell.

Mr. Bracher was a patient teacher, and he did not budge on his offer to teach Mickey for free.

Mickey will never understand it. Why the man gave him this  _ gift  _ for nothing, nothing in return. 

Mickey only told his mother about his lessons, who had agreed to help him keep it a secret from his father.

Music was soft. Terry didn’t need a musician for a son. He needed a soldier.

So, on days that Mickey had a lesson, they would make up an excuse. Detention, studying, sports. He was on the baseball team. It’s not like his father kept track of his practice schedule. Or came to a single game.

Mickey was nine when he played his first piece of anything even  _ resembling  _ classical music. It had been three years of juvenile melodies and agonizing over the basics, over technique. Bracher taught with a mix of the kiddie lesson books and junior Hanon training, all of which was boring and frustrating for an antsy kid that just wanted to play the music he heard spilling from his teacher’s fingertips every so often. But, when he was in fourth grade, Mr. Bracher finally flipped the page to a simplified version of  _ Für Elise _ . 

Mickey’s heart leapt when he saw the title. He had heard the tune countless times, by now.

When his mother first learned about his interest, she had passed along a sparse collection of records containing classical essentials: Chopin, Beethoven, Mozart, Brahms, Bach. Whatever it was, Mickey consumed it. Studied it. Until every accent was ringing in his bones when he found himself in the quiet. Until he could hum every movement of every sonata with complete accuracy.

Suffice to say, finally being able to learn something as famous as _Für Elise,_ dumbed down or not, was a game changer. Mickey never doubted his progress again, after that.

Fourth grade, incidentally, was also the same year he won his first fist fight.

He’d been in a few, with his brothers, with older kids that picked on him because he was small and dirty.

The fights with his father weren’t evenly matched, so he couldn’t call that losing.

But this time, when the kid swung, and Mickey took the hit, he shook it off, spit out the blood pooling on his tongue, and hit back, harder. 

Mr. Bracher frowned at his bruised knuckles at their next lesson, but did not comment. 

* * *

 

Ian didn’t even have an interest in reading music until he was nine. It all seemed so simple; by then, he could sit down and produce a new tune every time. Maybe it wasn’t as complicated as what Frank could play, but he could feel himself understanding it more. The piano was a puzzle, and no matter how many times he felt himself figure something out, another curveball was thrown his way to demote his comprehension. He didn’t know a thing about time signatures, or keys, or quarter notes or half notes or whole notes. They had music class at school, but the teacher just talked a lot about old, dead composers. Ian had a hard time caring about classical music. How could you like playing something you didn’t create?

Monica came back that year, too. Only for a week and a half, and only to rob their family blind, but she came back. And when Ian played, she listened, and she clapped, and she grinned. Told him she was proud. Then she requested a song, and he had to tell her that he didn’t know any real songs, and she told him that was the silliest thing she had ever heard. 

She bought him a year’s worth of lessons from an old woman down the street with some of the money she had taken. 

His teacher was a withered but kind old woman that gave him some beginner books, called him a prodigy, and put words to what he had already converted to impulse understanding. Their first lesson consisted mostly of the woman, Mrs. Jenkins, sitting and listening while Ian improvised, humming in agreement when something sounded especially good, and briefly explaining what the keys were called. He was bursting at the seams to thank his mother when it was over, but when he came home from his first lesson, Monica was gone.

* * *

 

Mickey was eleven when Mr. Bracher retired from teaching elementary school music. He had thought,  _ This is it, this is where it ends.  _ But Mr. Bracher pulled him aside on his last day of teaching and asked if they might continue their lessons privately.

“Why?” Mickey had asked. 

“You understand what I teach,” Mr. Bracher had answered, after some thought.

Mr. Bracher’s house was small and lived-in, with pictures of family scattered across every surface. The keys of his piano were more yellow than the one at school, and the pedal squeaked the smallest bit. But it was tuned, and it could rumble in fortissimo and whisper in pianissimo, so Mickey didn’t care. 

It was this year, sixth grade, that his father started taking an interest in him. 

Mickey was finally invited on a trip with his father and brothers midway through the school. 

He missed his lesson with the hollow hope that they weren’t doing what his common sense said they were doing.

He thought he’d seen plenty of blood. On himself, on his brothers. On television.

His father didn’t stop when the man had gotten the point. His father didn’t stop when the man had lost all recognizable facial features. His father didn’t stop.

His brothers advised him not to look away.

When they returned home that same day, his red-tinged trance brought him to Mr. Bracher, who fed him and didn’t ask why it was he couldn’t say a thing.

When he came home the next morning, his father reminded him of his place. 

“Milkoviches don’t pussy out.”

On the next run, Mickey watched its entirety with a dead stare, through a black eye, over a crooked nose.

* * *

 

Ian was eleven when he could honestly say that he could read music. He didn’t like it, he certainly didn’t prefer it, but he could do it. 

His family could no longer afford lessons, after his year was up, but Mrs. Jenkins gave him the rest of the books she had planned to pull him through, and he was left to his own devices.

His original music expanded, until he was playing things that surprised even himself with the complexity.

“You must learn to write this down!” Mrs. Jenkins used to insist at every lesson, before his funds ran out, and after they had dedicated time to sight reading.

But if he were to write it down, he couldn’t help but think, it would become exactly what he hated: material to read. 

No, his music was fleeting, spontaneous, an event you had to see to believe. Not something to be immortalized, and criticized. 

Playing felt like fire in his fingers, when he was left to his own devices. 

One night, when he was an inferno, Frank stumbled in, the man who had given him this gift in the first place, and told him to quit making such a racket. 

Fiona told him not to take it to heart.

He tried hard not to.

He only touched the piano when the house was empty, then.

Ian was also eleven when he kissed his first boy: a scraggly, tall blonde whose name he’s forgotten. It was under the El, the summer after sixth grade, when everything seemed like a good idea.

The boy hesitated for only a moment before decking him.

Ian thought twice about making the first move, from then on out. 

* * *

 

When Mickey was fourteen, his father deemed him ready to work. 

Work meant tattoos. An identifier, a blemish, so no one would forget. Not Mickey, not his father, not his mother, and certainly not the world.

Milkoviches don’t pussy out.

Iggy’s said ‘beat down’ and Joey’s said ‘smak down.’ Mickey picked ‘fuck u-up’ and felt like he was part of something, finally. 

He didn’t come to his next lesson, because his knuckles were raw and nearly infected, and the deep shame of his own lineage, his own obligation, had begun to set in. 

That week, he performed his first collection. His father took him, and only him, to the laundromat guy, an easy target, and told Mickey, “This one’s yours.”

Mickey saw the man, the man who had children at his school, who had knocked off a few cents for his mother when they used his place. Mickey saw the man, and then he didn’t, and then he swung. The sting of his freshly tattooed knuckles was agonizing, but he didn’t flinch. Couldn’t flinch. Couldn’t blink. 

His father threw an initiation party for him, after that, to welcome him to the family business. 

He lost his virginity at that party, to an overweight brunette chainsmoker on her second attempt at junior year. It didn’t feel like they all said it would, but he bragged about it like it was the fuck of the century. 

At home, his mother clung to a needle like she hadn’t before and his sister mangled her clothes and dated grown men.

At school, he started running his mouth too much, a new bravado with his father’s acceptance, but he found himself drawing back, loud yet alone.

He came back to lessons a month later, when the pent up panic in his chest couldn’t be released through his fists. 

Mr. Bracher didn’t say a word about his knuckles, or his absence. They resumed their work on Bürgmuller as if no time had passed at all.

* * *

 

When Ian was fourteen, he got a job at a convenience store, and found what he thought was love in his boss, a married man with two children. By then, he’d cemented his place as the quiet one, across the board. At home, at school, he would stick to his brother’s side and feel content to blend. 

His brother found him out, that year, and proved to be more accepting than Ian had ever hoped.

When he was fourteen, right on the cusp of fifteen, he made friends with Mandy Milkovich, a tough, sad girl with a million brothers. 

When Mandy tried to kiss him, he explained why they’d never work, for the second time in his life. 

She smiled a sad smile and offered to be his girlfriend, for their own safety.

She brought him to her house to study, and Ian found a new bubble, beyond the convenience store. 

Three weeks after they began their relationship, Mandy asked him to come to his father’s next party, that night.

She didn’t explain why. 

Ian knew why.

At the party, he was liberal with the alcohol, and found himself in a grayscale room, biting the palm of a dirt-smudged, scowling dream in all black.

The next round with his boss, after that, felt cold and mechanical. 

Life started to feel like radio waves, sometimes. Up a little, down a little. Hormones, maybe. 

He thought about the boy at the party a lot. Saw him around the Milkovich house, turned away every time to hide his blush, in a refusal to admit his desire to duplicate their encounter, sober.

He stayed after school often, when he didn’t work, to steal time with the piano in the music room. Slowly, and reluctantly, worked his way through the books Mrs. Jenkins had given him.

No one at home ever asked, when he would come through the door late, where he’d been. 

He watched his boss abandon his family, the next year. He watched a stern woman cry in her lack of surprise. He felt the consequences of his own actions.

* * *

 

When Mickey was sixteen, his father tried to convince him to drop out of high school. Mr. Bracher insisted the opposite, told him he had a good head on his shoulders, told him he had a future.

For a second, Mickey believed him.

Then his mother took one speedball too many. 

He found himself laughing through the pure terror of his father. He found himself thinking of boys when he fucked girls. He found himself putting his fist through walls unprovoked, alone at night, when the ache for something hopelessly different consumed him and the mirror said too much. The silence following his episodes was mind-numbing. Alone in a house of five.

His father threw more parties once his mother was gone. 

Mandy started dating a kid he vaguely knew from down the street.

At one of those parties, Mickey fucked the kid, a red-headed, sweet-faced nightmare in flannel. 

It was everything he had convinced himself sex wasn’t.

He found himself craving it again, like fucking dope, but he was too terrified, too genuinely scared shitless of the clarity with which he could recall it, even through the haze of the night.

The kid never sought him out, turned away in fear or disgust when Mandy would bring him over to their house, and Mickey threw himself into his music, instead; Mr. Bracher’s house became his home, more often than not.

His father stopped giving a shit. As long as Mickey was around to work, he was happy not to feed another mouth.

He stayed in school. Muddled through, scored detention to avoid going home. 

Mr. Bracher became the father he never had, that year. In all but blood and law. Pushed him to do his homework, study for his tests, think about the future. 

“You haven’t cried about your mother,” Mr. Bracher noticed, one day, in the aftermath.

“Milkoviches don’t,” he had regurgitated. 

Mr. Bracher had hummed in disapproval, but made no attempt to argue. “Then you put all that bullshit into your music,” he had directed, lowly. Because Mr. Bracher was far from soft. Kind. Not soft. Everything Mickey wished to be. Everything he just couldn’t decipher. His father wasn’t soft or kind. His father was cruel.

He didn’t want to be his father.

He put all that bullshit into his music. 

* * *

 

When Ian was sixteen, his mother came home again.

They grew comfortable with her rising action. 

This time, when she requested a song, Ian could play it, and no one told him to stop.

When Monica was around, Ian felt seen. Cautious, but seen. 

His mother took him to bars and laughed at his jokes and fell asleep to his music.

His mother slit her wrists on Thanksgiving Day. His mother broke his heart.

He drank to forget, he drank to feel, he drank to sleep. Skipped work, skipped school, skipped meals. 

It was mourning, until the first week passed. Then it was drowning. Then it was crazy.

_ Monica, _ they whispered.  _ Just like Monica. _

It was too soon. It was unforgiving. Sixteen, with the sight of his mother’s blood burned into his bones, into the back of his throat, into his temples, expected to swallow it down and keep going. 

They all saw him, then. 

They coerced him with sunshine, with favorite foods. They tuned the piano. They clung to their patience, until he finally sat up, against the will of the thick pounding in his head, and worked up the nerve to wash away his fear of a new day. 

His family took him to the clinic a day later. 

* * *

 

When Mickey was eighteen, Mr. Bracher convinced him to apply to Juilliard. He agonized over the essay, asking about how he would change the world with his talent, because the truth was, he had no fucking idea. He thought of Mr. Bracher, the man who gave and gave and gave, expecting nothing in return, slowly pulling him out of his father’s grasp, pushing him towards a future out of the game.

He wrote about Mr. Bracher. About the small scale. About the one-person sort of world. 

Mr. Bracher revealed, when Mickey worried over how to pay for the flight to complete his audition, that he had been putting away money for exactly this reason.

Mickey, for the first time, felt blatant, undeniable, unconditional love, directed towards him.

At his audition, as he tried not to marvel at the chrome shine of Manhattan, he played the first piece of classical music he ever heard: the piece by a man named Claude Debussy, a piece he now knew to be called  _ 2 Arabesques, No. 1 in E Major. _

His letter of acceptance came two months later. 

He cried, that night, with all the happiness and hopelessness in the world. 

Mr. Bracher helped him apply for scholarships. His lack of parental financial support, and his roots in America’s closest thing to Hell on Earth, scored him a nearly free ride.

Everything felt too good. Everything felt too easy.

He became the first in his family to graduate high school. 

His father did not come to his graduation. 

Mr. Bracher came. Mr. Bracher cheered louder than anyone else, it seemed, when Mickey walked across the stage. Mickey cheered back, letting out a, “Fuck yeah!” with diploma in hand, to his teachers’ distaste, and Mr. Bracher’s amusement.

He went back to his childhood home once more, after receiving his diploma, and his father informed him that now that he was done with his “pussy school shit,” he needed to start helping out full time. 

That night, when his father was out with his friends, he packed his shit as cohesively as he could, gave Mandy an uncharacteristic hug, and turned his back on his heritage for good.

* * *

 

Ian is eighteen when he falls off his pills, for the first time. Sick of the routines, sick of the beige, sick of the dark circles and clockwork chemicals. 

He began to write down his music, that year. Write it down, throw it out, write it down, burn it up, rinse, repeat. 

He worked ahead in his classes. Asked for extra credit, only half of which he finished.

In a fit of energy, he applied to Juilliard, against his family’s warnings. Sought out mass amounts of scholarships. Set on proving his brother wasn’t the only one with a future. 

When he went back on the pills, after a crash worse than the one before, he was three months away from graduation and one month away from an audition in New York. 

He booked the cheapest flight he could find, with what savings he had, and agonized over the last remaining piece of his mania.

The murmurs after his announcement of an “original piece” did nothing to shake the flawlessness of his performance. 

His acceptance letter comes a week before graduation, along with the news of his scholarships. 

And now he stares, speechless, at the words, until they began to swim. Tries to blink away the thought of his illness doing something to help him. 

His sister confiscates his diploma, framing it next to his brother’s, a paper full of the things he’ll never retain. 

And he prays for love in New York. He prays for something else, something new, something more than strict 8 am breakfasts and the dull beat of his heart. Something to pinch him out of a trance. He tries to remember what excitement feels like, again, tries to remember if this is it, this sated, distantly panicked glow. 

He wants to feel the fire again, he thinks, of his own artistry. He wants to feel the ache.

He moves to New York exactly one month later. 


	2. Pastorale

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [btw this is a playlist with all the songs in the fic that i'll be updating as i write](https://open.spotify.com/user/merishaw14/playlist/2OwnLseR6Vk2jhmoDeaxo4)

Ian loves Manhattan. It’s everything he’d dreamed about, back home, as a gentle kid clashing with the sharp edges of his circumstances. The residence hall is incredible, in the top floors of a building overlooking the Hudson River. He’s fallen into a new routine, over the summer: seven a.m. wake up call, walk down to the corner for a cheap cup of coffee, wait for it to cool down while he takes the long route back to his apartment, pills as soon as he gets back, then prep to work at the consignment shop at ten.

He’s about three-quarters through his routine this morning, double-shot macchiato in hand, smiling slightly in the muted wind and fading summer. He’s walking against the thin grain, and his coffee is just cool enough now to drink, as he hits his next turn and his phone buzzes in his pocket.

He pulls it out and sighs when he sees a text from his roommate, Carter, a drama major from California.

_8:24 a.m._

_From: Carter_

_911 our third guy is finally here_

Ian swallows at the text, pocketing his phone again and taking a deep breath.

Ian had been the first to move in, in mid-June, with the school’s permission and a promise that he’d pay extra board. Carter, his assigned roommate with whom he had made fairly fast friends, had followed a few weeks after. They had been one of the few apartments to be down one roommate, a fact that they were both very comfortable with, considering the size of their living space. They get along, him and Carter, because Ian keeps Carter straight, and Carter gets him out of the house on Friday nights.

A third person is not what they need, when they have such a delicate balance of will.

They had received the news of their third roommate, some guy named Derek from somewhere in the UK, two weeks ago, and had tried everything they could to talk to him beforehand, to feel him out, to no avail. No response to texts, no follow back on social media, not even a fucking email.

And now Ian’s morning of simple routine is, essentially, fucking wrecked.

He tightens his grip on his coffee and picks up his pace, abandoning his long route for a more direct one, pulling out his phone again to text Carter back an assurance of his five-minute arrival. He’s just hitting send when he collides directly into the back of a guy who has stopped at the crosswalk, coffee lid coming loose and macchiato spilling down the front of his own shirt and the other guy’s back.

“What the fuck--” the guy, short but built, with a black, grown-out undercut exclaims, but Ian, truly assimilated to not giving a fuck in times of crisis, only mumbles a barely audible, “Fuck, sorry,” without stopping to even glance at the guy.

“Hey, fuck you, asshat!” the guy yells, followed by some muttering, fading away as Ian speeds along.

He’ll be fine, Ian reasons. It’s New York. You can’t walk two feet without bumping into someone else.

He hurries on through the next crosswalk a block down, ignoring the wait signal across the way, and turns onto his street, rushing through the lobby with a wave to the man at the front desk, and barely slipping into the elevator on time, joining a red-faced woman in a bright pink tracksuit.

“Gorgeous day,” she comments.

Ian nods. “Yeah.”

“Do you run? You look like you run,” she continues.

“Sometimes,” he humors.

“Have you been living in this building for long--”

The elevator dings, and the doors slide open, as Ian abandons what the woman probably felt was the beginning scene to her own personal rom-com.

“Have a nice day!” he calls over his shoulder, as she waves wistfully at his retreat.

He arrives at his door, slightly overheated, thirty seconds later. He takes a deep breath, holding it in to steady himself, before he pulls his key from his pocket, catching a glimpse of his ruined shirt and exhaling out in irritation.

Who the fuck waits at an empty crosswalk, anyway?

He slips his key into the lock, but doesn’t have the opportunity to turn it before the door is swinging open to reveal Carter’s smiling face.

Small and thin, his roommate has “theater kid” written all over his dainty, olive-skinned face. Shiny, meticulously tousled black hair falls over sparkling almond eyes.

Very sparkling, Ian notices.

“Hey,” Ian greets, a little cautiously.

“Hey,” Carter responds, quietly, with another weird smile.

“He’s here?” Ian asks, peering around Carter into the seemingly empty apartment.

“Oh, _he’s here,_ ” Carter confirms. “In his bedroom.”

Ian stares at him for a second expectantly, rolling his eyes when Carter doesn’t move. “Are you going to let me in, Carter?”

“Are you ready for this?” Carter inquires.

“I have no idea. I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Ian answers tiredly.

“It’s _Malone Ingham,_ ” Carter whispers.

Ian squints at him, brain rather slow from the abrupt cut off of caffeine, but he soon blinks in stunned recognition.

Malone Ingham, virtuoso pianist and winner of the last World Piano Competition (the one in 2016, before the organization shut down), is a big fucking deal in the music world. Trained since he was able to walk, he’s a modern-day Mozart.

Ian’s seen the videos of his performance. The title isn’t an exaggeration.

“I thought his name was _Derek_ or something,” Ian argues.

He is not prepared to accept that he is going to be living with a world-renowned classical pianist.

“That’s his first name. Malone is his middle name. He--” Carter snaps his mouth shut at the sound of a door clicking closed in the apartment. “Just come inside,” Carter directs, moving away from the entrance and ushering Ian in.

Ian sets his ruined coffee cup on the kitchen counter, and directs his attention towards the guy coming out of their previously spare bedroom.

Ian’s only really seen him in the context of his performances, but as he approaches, his appearance is unmistakable: Chocolate brown, loose waves over piercing, gray eyes and a jawline made for a massacre.

_Fuck._

“Hello,” Malone greets with a dimpled smile. “Are you the other flatmate?”

“Uh, yeah,” Ian confirms, offering his hand, which Malone takes firmly. His hands, Ian notes, are fucking huge. “Ian. Gallagher.”

“Malone Ingham,” Malone answers, like it’s a trademark. “Gallagher,” he repeats. “Are you Irish?”

“Well, I’m from Chicago,” Ian informs him lamely, cringing at Malone’s polite nod, with a look of ‘ _Who is this weird fucking guy?’_ in his eyes. “But yeah,” he adds quickly. “My family’s Irish.”

“Have you ever been?” Malone asks.

“To Ireland?” Ian laughs. “I haven’t even been to Canada.”

“It’s a lovely country,” Malone tells him. “You should visit sometime.”

“Canada?”

Malone smiles graciously. “Ireland.”

“Ah,” Ian says, nodding a bit. “Maybe I will, once I’m making more than minimum wage.”

“I’ll have to take you both, on holiday,” Malone offers. “Of course, I normally perform when I’m not studying anywhere, but I’m sure you two would be able to find your way around alright.”

Ian nods, highly doubting that will ever happen.

“So, what brought you to Juilliard?” Carter asks, breaking through the pause, crossing his arms.

“I was invited to attend, as a sort of...morale boost to the other students,” Malone explains. “And I thought, well, why not give it a chance? I love to inspire.”

Maybe it should be perceived as cocky, but Ian can’t help but acknowledge that his desire to do well has more than doubled in the last two minutes.

“And you’re a freshman?” Ian inquires, eyes flicking along the length of Malone’s figure. He certainly doesn’t _look_ eighteen.

“Well, I never went to any sort of university back home, since I had a career right out of secondary school,” Malone explains. “So I’m twenty-one, but I’m starting in the freshman class, yes.”

“There’s no way for you to, like, test out of that shit?” Carter asks.

“Yeah, it seems kind of unfair for you to study stuff you already know,” Ian agrees, glancing back down at the huge coffee stain on his shirt again.

Maybe _that’s_ why Malone is looking at him like he’s fucking insane.

“Well, nobody’s ever really done learning,” Malone answers cheerfully, with another winning smile. “And it’s Juilliard! I’m sure it’ll be a challenge for me, too.”

“Well, we can take you out for some drinks tonight, if you want,” Carter suggests. “We’ve been here for a couple months, so we’re starting to know some of the best spots.”

Malone flashes another smile, running a hand through his hair. “Yes, I would love that. When would you like to leave?”

“Well, I work until six, but after that I can hang out for a few hours.” Ian looks down at his shirt. “I should probably do some laundry before I leave. Rear-ended some guy this morning at a crosswalk and spilled coffee everywhere.”

“Yeah, I need to unpack,” Malone sighs.  

“You need any help?” Carter offers.

“No, no, I’m sure you both have full days. I did arrive with no word.” Malone raises his hand in a small wave, before backing towards his bedroom. “Glad to finally meet you both.”

“Yeah, you, too,” Ian calls after him, earning himself another smile.

Malone seems to have a lot of those.

When Malone’s door thuds shut softly, Ian turns slowly to look at Carter with wide eyes.

Carter sucks his teeth. “Laundry room in five minutes.”

Ian nods, slightly dazed, and abandons the room to gather his dirty clothes.

* * *

 In all honesty, Mickey hates Manhattan with a passion.

It’s not New York in particular that he hates; he loves living in Brooklyn, and he loves his school, but there’s just something entitled and artificial about Manhattan itself that makes Mickey’s skin crawl, when it’s presented in its purest form.

Like the douchebag that spilled coffee all down Mickey’s back at a crosswalk this morning, on his walk from the subway to the Juilliard building, who didn’t even stop to apologize. It was a general punishment for just _existing_ in a place as stupidly shiny as Manhattan, he guesses. Ruining one of his few nice shirts.

He thinks about it now, as he absently plays the piece his teacher has given him to learn, every passage taking on a fairly blocky, angry tone. It’s an easy piece, not something that takes his whole concentration to play with technical perfection, and Mickey knows better than to let his mind wander during a practice, but that _fucking guy--_

“No, no, _stop,_ Mikhailo,” Dr. Nowack calls above the music, bringing his palm down flat on top of the piano with a dull thud. “I need this _perfect_ for tomorrow. What good will a mediocre arrangement do?”

“This is your arrangement,” Mickey mutters in reply, hands falling lightly to rest on the keys, as Nowack paces away with a troubled look.

“What was that?” Nowack inquires, spinning around in challenge.

Mickey decides not to press his luck, and shrugs, busying himself with the folded upper corner of the sheet music.

“I need it perfect,” Nowack repeats, resuming his pacing.

“If you think my playing’s so shit, why don’t you play it?” Mickey suggests.

Nowack shakes his head feverishly. “No, I need you to inspire them. To be attainable.”

Mickey huffs out a stunted laugh. “Attainable. Guess I’ve been called worse.”

Nowack looks at him over his glasses tiredly. “You are a performer, Mikhailo. Where is your expression, right now? What are you thinking?”

Mickey squints at the notation, and considers the question.

He’s thinking a lot of things, on a lot of different levels.

On one level, he’s thinking about how the practice has run through lunch.

On a different level, he’s thinking about dumbass fucking crosswalk-coffee guy.

On the deepest level, he supposes, he’s thinking primal, fluid things that can’t be put into words, only shifted and waded through and, eventually, projected.

“I’m fuckin’ hungry,” he settles on. “That’s what I’m thinking.”

“Mikhailo, if I did not believe in the freedom of speech and an artist’s right to eccentricity, I would beat that swearing right out of you.”

Mickey rolls his eyes at his teacher’s back, and returns a false attention to the piece.

Nowack isn’t the worst, in all honesty. Once you wade past him being a pompous, pretentious, European prick, he’s a good teacher, if you learn through fear and spite.

Maybe that isn’t fair; he’s a brilliant man, in all honesty. A seasoned concert pianist, there’s nobody in the world that understands expression and performance better than Dr. _I’m-an-asshole-for-your-own-good_ Nowack.

However, when Mickey received the news that he would have to serve as a fucking teacher’s assistant, Nowack wasn’t even his fifth choice for a boss.

The guy’s a fucking drama queen, evidenced by Mickey’s current orders: intimidate the shit out of the freshmen. Mickey would have no problem with that task, if he were allowed to use anything but, God forgive him, _artistic flair_.

Nowack’s plan is simple: the teacher will play some dumbed down Tchaikovsky symphony, during which Mickey will slip into the room to appear as if he has the power of teleportation, and then he’ll stand by the piano menacingly to wait while Nowack baits some new kid into looking stupid.

Mickey would be fine with that plan, if Nowack weren’t so fucking anal about its execution.

“Alright, from the top, Mikhailo, if you can take your mind off your stomach for two minutes,” Nowack barks.

Mickey inhales, tries to focus solely on the flow of artistic energy, and repositions his fingers.

“Et...commencer.”

* * *

 “I don’t know, I just _feel_ like something is wrong with him,” Ian says, dropping a towel into the washer.

Carter sits on top of the dryer next to him, feet dangling. “What, a guy can’t just be perfect?”

“No.”

“He was checking you out,” Carter notes.

Ian ignores him, in favor of shoving a few pairs of jeans into the washer.

“He’s openly gay,” Carter sings.

“I’m not gonna fuck our roommate, Carter,” Ian negates firmly, peeling off his stained shirt and adding it to the load.

“Our roommate? No. But _Malone Ingham--_ ”

“I’m not gonna fuck Malone Ingham,” Ian rephrases, gathering up an armful of shirts.

“I will if you don’t,” Carter says, with a grin.

“You’re dating Julie,” Ian reminds him, as he fiddles with the switches on the washer.

“So you _don’t_ want me to fuck him.”

“I don’t care what you do, Carter.”

“Because _you_ want to fuck him.”

“Don’t.”

“Because _you’re_ a starstruck little slut.”

“Fuck you.”

Carter breathes out a laugh. “You haven’t brought a guy home in weeks, Ian. I’m starting to wonder if you became a priest or something.”

Ian sighs as he shuts the door, pushes a button, and the washer roars to life. He hops up on top of it, mirroring Carter. “Everyone’s just kind of starting to feel the same,” he admits, after a second. “Like, I expected the guys in New York to be new, or something, but they’re all the same. I--” He bites off his next sentence obstinately, gazing down at the concrete floor.

“You what?” Carter prods, after a beat.

Ian chews his lip, his grip tightening on the edge of the washer. “Alright,” he exhales. “If I tell you something stupid, you can’t laugh. Or tell me how stupid it is. Because I know how stupid it is.”

Carter raises his eyebrows, then shrugs. “Alright.”

“Like, four years ago,” Ian begins, staring down at his feet sheepishly, “I was with this one guy, at a party. My beard’s brother. And it was...fuckin’ incredible, y’know? And I--I keep looking for someone that makes me feel, like, the same way I remember feeling that night, but I haven’t. After four years.” He tries not to think of the Milkovich kid, again, but it’s hard, when he swears he can still almost feel the marks scratched into his back that night. “And I don’t even know what happened to him. He just fuckin’ disappeared one day. I went over to their house, and he was gone, and he never came back. But I still…” He pauses, searching for the right words to express the ache, the near insanity he’s driven to when he thinks about what could have been. “I still think about him. A lot.” He smiles, a bit bitterly. “And I can barely remember his face, really.”

Carter stares at him through the monologue, with an expression produced purely to question his sanity. “Dude, what the fuck are you talking about?”

Ian opens his mouth to defend himself, but Carter cuts him off.

“You fucked some kid when you were fourteen and you’re using that as an excuse not to date new people? I call bullshit.”

“It’s not bullshit,” Ian protests. “And I told you, I already know it’s stupid.”

“Fucking right, it’s stupid,” Carter reiterates. “That guy is probably doing community service for petty theft, and you’re living with a celebrity in Manhattan that you could totally sleep with. It’s time to move on.”

He’s right, of course. Of course he is. The kid is long gone and long, long past caring. It doesn’t matter that sometimes Ian thinks about him, at night, when he can’t sleep. The memory has become like a staple in his mind; something solid and bittersweet, like his thoughts of home, or a familiar fairy tale. Which is striking, considering the bulk of the encounter was only a quick, hushed fuck.

“Yeah, I know,” Ian agrees, after a moment. He sighs. “Think I have a chance with Malone?”

Carter shrugs, with a grin. “No harm in trying.”

* * *

 “It’s just bullshit, man,” Mickey complains through a mouthful of popcorn, over the sound of _Worst Cooks in America._ His roommate, Jordan, listens vacantly with a bored expression, dark, thick hair pulled back in a messy ponytail, large brown eyes trained on the television, head balanced on her fist. “I punched one guy. Who called me a faggot. And now I’m a fuckin’ slave.”

“Actions do typically have consequences,” Jordan mumbles in monotone.

“Fuck you, actions have consequences.” Mickey reaches for the popcorn bowl again, and Jordan offers it to him tiredly. “Tell me you wouldn’t slug some dude that called you a dyke.”

Jordan shrugs, and Mickey takes it as a surrender.

“What the fuck kind of homophobe goes to _Juilliard?”_ he continues. “You can’t walk two feet without bumpin’ into one of us.”

“Maybe he thought you were hot,” Jordan suggests. “Maybe he was jealous you were dating Kendrick.”

“Or jealous Kendrick was dating me,” Mickey mutters over the rim of his beer.

“How’s Kendrick been?” Jordan asks, apparently completely abandoning her attempts to pay attention to the show. “You seen him since he got back?”

Kendrick, a golden-haired violinist from Buttfuck, Kansas, had been their third roommate last year. And, for a period of time, Mickey’s first boyfriend.

“Yeah, we got a drink, day after he moved into his new place,” Mickey tells her. Jordan raises a suggestive eyebrow at him. “ _With his new boyfriend,_ ” he adds. “Some fucker he met at a club or somethin’.”

“Why would he bring his boyfriend to hang out with his ex-boyfriend?” Jordan wonders.

“I don’t fuckin’ know, to show me he’s moved on? To make his boyfriend feel better? I don’t know why Kendrick does anything.” Mickey takes another sip of beer. “Couldn’t give less of a shit, though.”

“Don’t miss him?” Jordan asks, like she already knows the answer.

“Nah,” Mickey answers, shaking his head. “Maybe as, like, a friend. But he was too fuckin’ needy. Wanted me to treat him like a fuckin’ girl. But that’s the beauty of a _gay_ relationship, right? You’re both guys.”

Jordan sniffs. “Misogyny really does transcend sexuality, huh?”

“I don’t even want a fuckin’ boyfriend,” Mickey says, ignoring her. “I don’t think that’s my thing.”

“Shit!” Jordan exclaims, eyes trained on the television. “I think they’re gonna send home Josh.”

“Fuck Josh.”

“Josh is my favorite.”

“Josh fuckin’ sucks.”

“That’s why he’s my favorite.”

Mickey blows a strand of hair out of his eyes. “I think I’m gonna go out tonight.”

“Don’t you have nerd duty in the morning?” Jordan reminds him.

“Yeah, but if I don’t bang someone tonight, I’ll kill some freshman tomorrow.”

“You could just bang a freshman tomorrow,” Jordan suggests. “Two birds, one stone.”

“Like fuck am I gonna bang some clingy teenager with his head lodged up his own ass.”

“So find one that’ll lodge his head up your ass,” Jordan retorts. “Prey on the weak.”

“I’m done with these fuckin’ performing arts students, man,” Mickey brushes off. “Just too fuckin’ dramatic.”

Jordan snorts. “Remember that letter Kendrick wrote you, before he left?”

“The one where he practically called me the spawn of Satan for not fuckin’ proposing?” Mickey clarifies. “Yeah, I remember.”

“Dumping someone by letter is, like, top tier pussy,” Jordan comments with a laugh. “At least with a text it gives the other person a shot at the last word.”

Mickey chuckles, and elbows her lightly. “So come on, you wanna come out with me? We can go to that place you like in the East Village.”

Jordan squints, looking away from the television to consider his offer. “The expensive one that makes the crazy good cocktails?”

Mickey grins, recognizing it as a yes.

* * *

 Ian loves the East Village more than any other neighborhood in Manhattan. It feels free, and fresh, and worn all at once, with a constant flow of unique things to do and see.

The night air is thick with the end of summer, and Ian shoulders up beside Malone as they walk down the street to Carter’s favorite bar.

“So I’m sixteen, and I’m playing this big show,” Malone recounts, as Ian tucks his hands into the pockets of his jacket, “in Hungary. And the President, you know, of Hungary is there, and some other important people, I don’t know. And I’m playing a set of Chopin, and I’m in the middle of a Nocturne, when someone starts cheering. I suppose because they thought I was doing well. But, it completely shook me out of my concentration, and I had to pause for nearly twenty seconds to right myself. In front of the President of Hungary! Mortified.”

“I feel you,” Carter says. “When I did work on commercials as a kid, we spent a whole day on set filming one shot because I couldn’t say the line, ‘Get mixin’ in your kitchen!’”

“What word were you even messing up?” Ian asks.

“Kitchen. I kept saying chicken, instead.” Carter pauses, eyes skirting between the looks of judgement from Malone and Ian. “I was four! Cut me a break.”

“When did you start performing, Malone?” Ian inquires, brushing over his other roommate.

Malone, Ian has learned in the short amount of time that he has personally known the performer, has no shortage of interesting anecdotes. He could probably talk for hours, Ian thinks, and not run out of things to say and stories to tell. He’s led a large life; larger than Ian even thought possible.

“I was seven when I first competed,” Malone recounts. “But I’ve had recitals from age three. Though, the performances where I played oversimplified etudes aren’t examples of my best work.”

Ian thinks it’s the summer air, but he feels hopeful. Important, even. Being around Malone, in this city, makes him feel like a character in The Great Gatsby, or something. Young and full of nothing to say.

* * *

East Village bars are like nails on a chalkboard to Mickey, sometimes. Usually, when he wants to pick someone up, he goes to a select few low-key bars back in Brooklyn. He’s not much of a fan of a place that calls itself a ‘speak-easy’, and he doesn’t trust drinks that don’t taste like alcohol and get you hammered before you can stop and think, “Do I want to wake up in Hell tomorrow?” The drinks are fucking expensive, and every time he comes here with Jordan, she finds some sloppy, progressive, bi-curious college girl to ditch him for.

Tonight is no exception, and Mickey orders his third over-priced beer of the night, leaning an elbow on the bar and scanning the room, catching the tail end of Jordan’s ponytail as she slips away, out the front door of the bar, with some other girl. Her absence is replaced immediately by the entrance of three guys, a curly-haired, square-jawed one, a short, slight Asian one, and a tall redhead in a worn leather jacket and bleach-splattered jeans.

Mickey looks away to the rest of the unchanged room, before his eyes snap back with a sudden thought.

He squints at the redhead as he and his friends make their way across the room, breaking into a chorus of soft laughter.

He could _swear_ he’s seen that face, before.

He takes a sip of his beer, and tries not to stare for too long.

It’s on his third glance that he recognizes him, to some degree: the guy from this morning, at the crosswalk. The idiot that doused him with coffee.

For a second, Mickey thinks that maybe this is the universe’s way of giving him a shot at retribution.

But, no. He looks again, with an annoyed glare, this time, and something about the guy holds a deeper familiarity than just an asshole rushing past him on the street.

The group approaches the bar, and Mickey quickly averts his eyes, tracing a line through the condensation on his glass and racking his brain. He takes another drink, and glances over at the guy’s profile, heartbeat accented when the guy’s gaze flits back in return, catching him in his thoughts.

Mickey raises an eyebrow. The corner of the guy’s mouth hitches up.

Mickey’s just about to ask if they know each other when one of his friends, the curly-haired one, calls down the bar, “Oh, Ian, what would you like to drink?”

That name. Something about it sends a shock of recognition down Mickey’s spine, and he chances another glance, eyes skirting down the curve of his lips to the angle of his jaw. Insanely familiar.

“Just a beer, man,” the guy calls back. “Can’t do the hard stuff.”

The voice rings a bell, too, but only slightly, as if Mickey’s heard it before, but lesser. Younger, maybe.

Ian. Ian. Ian?

Mickey looks over, then, with sudden realization, all subtlety thrown out the window.

Ian _Gallagher?_

Dopey-eyed, freckle-faced, boy-next-door Ian Gallagher? _Convenience store_ Ian Gallagher?

Ian looks to the side, again, once he’s finished choosing his beer, to catch Mickey’s (probably terrified) expression as his eyes skirt over the filled out form of his overgrown memory. Ian opens his mouth, maybe to ask what the fuck Mickey wants, before Mickey forces his gaze away to the bartender, who is just passing by.

“Hey, another lager,” Mickey calls out, emphasizing the request by finishing off the drink in front of him, setting down the glass with a satisfying _thud_ just as the new beer is slid over to him. He takes the glass in hand, and slips off the stool, not glancing back as he strides over to an empty table, far away from the bar.

What the fuck is Ian Gallagher doing in the East Village? It's got to be a mistake, on his part. He squints at the man’s now-distant profile, and tries to equate the scrawny, smiling kid that had dated his sister to the acid-washed, model-looking, stutter-inducing human being at the bar. Ian and his friends raise their drinks in a toast for something, and the other two knock it all back, while Ian just takes a sip of beer.

“Buy you another?”

Mickey shifts his gaze from Ian to the source of the question: a tall, lumberjack type, with a neatly trimmed, dark beard, and a beer in each hand.

Mickey shrugs, with the hint of a smirk, as the guy takes a seat across from him.

“Ted,” the guy introduces, leaning back easily in his chair.

Mickey nods. “Mickey.”

Ted raises an eyebrow, mouth curving in a small smile. “That short for something?”

“Is Ted short for somethin’?” Mickey asks into his glass, not about to hear how cute and exotic a name like ‘Mikhailo’ is from someone who’s probably named ‘Theodore’.

Ted grins, then, getting the point. He raises his glass. “To names we resent our mothers for, then.”

“Sure, yeah.” Mickey raises his beer in return. “To that.”

He looks over at Ian one more time, to find he’s moved to sit next to the curly-haired friend, listening raptly as the other guy talks about something emphatically, with large hand movements.

“So what do you do for a living?”

Mickey blinks, shaking himself away from the redhead and back to Ted.

Ian Gallagher, Mickey reminds himself, is not the approachable, school-concerned kid he remembers, anymore. And even when Ian Gallagher _was_ that approachable, school-concerned kid, he still didn’t want shit to do with Mickey after they fucked. And judging by the blank, only vaguely interested expression on his face when he had looked Mickey’s way at the bar, he didn’t recognize Mickey, anyway.

“I’m a concert pianist,” Mickey answers, finally pushing his past out of his mind to focus on the present, sitting across from him. “In training.”

* * *

 One of the most annoying parts about his prescription, besides the constant, looming fact that he will never be chemically balanced and high-functioning without them, is that he can’t drink like he used to. Now, at the bar, as Carter and Malone order celebratory cocktails and engage in buzzed chatter, Ian is left to slowly sip a beer, painfully sober.

His mind wanders back to how the guy beside him was eyeing him at the bar, and the strange pang of disappointment he had felt when the guy had, apparently, changed his mind about either wanting to fight or fuck Ian, (hard to derive from the charged look in his eye), and had settled down to laugh with some bearded bear in flannel.

Something about the way their eyes met felt meaningful, though. Like he's supposed to recognize the guy.

“Ian, mate, are you alright?” Malone asks, and Ian quickly looks away from the guy, returning his attention to his drink.

“Don’t look now, but I feel like I might know that guy,” Ian explains in a hushed tone. “That guy that was next to us when we sat down.”

Carter and Malone both turn in tandem, leaving Ian to hiss at them to chill fuck out.

“I told you not to look,” he complains through gritted teeth, casting another glance over his shoulder, relieved to find the guy oblivious to the attention.

“You think he goes to Juilliard?” Carter asks, taking a sip of his cocktail.

“I don’t--” Then it hits Ian, causing a full stop in his speech. “Oh, _shit._ I ran into him this morning. Like, literally, _ran into him._ ”

Carter stares at him in confusion for a second, before letting out a sound of realization. “Coffee-crosswalk guy,” he says.

“Coffee-crosswalk guy,” Ian repeats in agreement. " _That's_ why he was looking at me like he was ready to strangle me." He raises his beer to his lips. “Glad that mystery’s solved.”

“This bar reminds me of a little place in Amsterdam,” Malone observes, changing the subject. “Very earthy and local.”

“What were you up to in Amsterdam?” Ian asks, turning his full attention to Malone, who launches into a story about his backpacking tour through Europe, all of which Ian remembers enjoying, but none of which, by the end, he can recall in detail.

* * *

 Mickey blinks awake, the room a white blur for a good few seconds before his ceiling fan comes into focus, and the feeling of an arm over his waist becomes readily apparent.

He tries hard to picture what face he’ll see when he wakes the guy up to kick him out, to no avail. He briefly remembers getting through $42 worth of Czechoslovakian lager before leaving with somebody.

He blinks again, and a sudden vision of a familiar face, a Chicago-level familiar face, haunts him for a second.

_Ian Gallagher?_

Ian Gallagher. Canaryville Ian Gallagher was there, last night, at the bar. It’s unfocused, still, but Mickey would bet money on it.

The weight of the body pressed against him suddenly holds more gravity, as Mickey’s heart pounds and he tries desperately to remember.

It can’t be him. It couldn’t have been him. Mickey’s almost too scared to look, now, his irrational panic infinitely louder than his common sense.

Canaryville Ian Gallagher was not at a bar in Manhattan, and Canaryville Ian Gallagher is most certainly not currently in Mickey’s bed.

He swallows, turning his head to the right reluctantly, unable to decipher whether the feeling in his stomach is relief or disappointment when a bearded, most-definitely-not-Ian-Gallagher face greets him.

He squints at the guy, and grasps for his name.

_Tad. Todd. Tyler? No, definitely a ‘d’ at the end. Ted? Ted!_

“Hey,” he prods, voice raspy, raising his hand to rest on Ted’s arm, shaking a little bit. “Wake up, man.” He sits up, head swimming the slightest bit, and rubs the fogginess from his eyes. He reaches for his phone, screen lighting up, and his eyes widen at the time, shocking him to full alertness. “ _Shit,_ ” he hisses out, swinging his legs out of the bed and standing, without pause, ignoring the slight pounding in his temples and rushing to his closet.

Ted stirs with a slight groan, stretching and turning onto his back. “Have somewhere to be?” he mumbles out.

“Yes, I fuckin’ have somewhere--hey, get up! Get the fuck up, you need to go,” Mickey barks as he tears through his clothes, pulling a plain white t-shirt and a pair of jeans free. He tugs on his boxers roughly.

“The hell is the rush?” Ted yawns, sitting up and stretching.

“I’m a fuckin’ TA this year, man, I’m gonna be late for--you know what? It don’t matter, fuckin’ get dressed before I kick you out bare ass naked.”

Ted raises his hands in surrender, eyes partially shut, as he follows Mickey out of bed, collecting his clothes from a heap on the ground and slowly pulling them on.

“I don’t even fuckin’ have time to shower,” Mickey mutters, looking at himself in the small mirror on his closet door as he runs a hand through his hair.

“You look great,” Ted reassures, with a crooked smile, as he pulls a tank top over his head.

“I just don’t wanna show up smellin’ like a fuckin’ distillery when I’m on probation for shit at school,” Mickey explains shortly, pulling on the jeans.

“Where do you go to school?” Ted asks, slipping his flannel over his arms.

“Juilliard,” Mickey responds distractedly, yanking on the t-shirt. He hurries over to his small bureau, reaching for his deodorant and applying it roughly.

“Juilliard?” Ted repeats, with a hint of surprise.

“Yes, Juilliard,” Mickey sighs, squatting down in front of his messenger bag, propped up against his bureau, and rifling through it to check he has everything. “Shit, I need coffee.”

“I’ll go pour you a cup,” Ted offers, starting for the door.  
“No, no, don’t worry about it,” Mickey stops him, standing up and slinging the bag over his shoulder. “I’ll just take a few Excedrin, that has caffeine in it.” They pause, then, as Ted seems to wait expectantly for something. Mickey raises his eyebrows impatiently. “Dude, I had to be somewhere, like, ten minutes ago.”

Ted shuffles sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck with a smile. “I was just wondering, you know, if I could get your number.”

Mickey sucks his teeth. “Well, I could give it to you, but I ain’t gonna pick up, so what’s the point, right?”

“But, last night was really--”

“I’m sure,” Mickey cuts him off in irritation, and he sighs at the look of slight hurt on Ted’s face. “Jesus.” He pauses, reluctant to vocalize his next thought. “If I give you my number, will you leave? Please? So I don’t get expelled from fuckin’ Juilliard?”

Ted beams, pulling out his phone. “Deal.”

It’s ten minutes, one awkward goodbye, and two Excedrin later that Mickey is jogging to the subway, rushing through the turnstile, and slipping through the rapidly closing doors of the train at the last second. 

* * *

 

“It is just fantastic to be in New York, again,” Malone gushes to Ian, as they wait for their first class to start. They’re seated in a dim, white classroom, not much different from the shifting beige of his childhood, save for the noise of Manhattan ever distantly present. “Every time I come back, it feels like it’s the first time again. And now I’m living here!”

“It is incredible to me how energetic you are this morning,” Ian comments, glancing over at Malone’s boyish smile. “Considering how many cocktails you and Carter had last night.”

“Oh, please,” Malone dismisses with a wave of his hand. “I have a _few_ drinks before every show. Barely does anything to me. My ma is Italian, and we would take a little bit of watered down wine with our meals. Probably taught me to drink in moderation, or something.”

Ian smiles crookedly. “That’s cute. My dad was an alcoholic. Taught me not to drink at all.”

Malone blinks in surprise. “Oh, well...I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

Ian chews on the sincerity of the response for a second, nodding slightly, before breaking into laughter. “I was just joking, Malone.”

Malone’s eyebrows draw together, before he laughs nervously, as well. “Your father wasn’t an alcoholic, then?”

“No, he was, he was,” Ian replies, and Malone’s smile shrinks again. “Just, you know, laughter, best therapy.”

“Alright, alright, ladies, gentlemen, cut the conversation, as it is nine o’clock, and you are my captive audience for the next hour.”

Ian turns away from Malone to the front of the room, where a tall, graying man with a solid build and wire rimmed glasses stands, hands pressed together in front of him like he’s saying a silent prayer.

He must be Dr. Nowack, Ian reasons, the professor heading the _Piano Performance I_ class.

Nowack utilizes a pause, in which the class quiets down and focuses on him, and he allows the students to make their own deductions about who he is, foregoing any introduction. “Music,” Nowack states sharply in a fading European accent, “is relative.”

Ian blinks at the man from his seat in the middle of the compact group of students, and chances a glance at Malone, who tilts his head in a half-shrug, his eyes sparkling as if he’s already having the time of his life.

“What do I mean by that? I can see it on your faces. All of you play the piano, yes? But none of you understand _music_ , yet. That is what you are here for.” The professor strides over to the computer on his desk, and clicks a few times. “I would like you to listen to the theme from the first movement of Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No.6, in B Minor. A Pathetique. Really listen. Close your eyes, think on it. Consider it.”

The professor clicks one more time, and the room is suddenly awash in the sound of an orchestra. It’s a sincere, wistful melody, large as it is small. Objectively beautiful, easy to like. Ian has a hard time caring.

_What’s the point?_

Dr. Nowack stands at the front, eyes scanning over the class as they listen. Like the music has something hidden within it that they should be searching for. When the music stops, the silence lingers for a few seconds.

“Does anybody know what this piece is assumed to be written about?” Dr. Nowack asks.

A boy with almond eyes and tousled brown hair speaks up. “It was the last symphony he ever composed. People think it’s about his struggle with homosexuality in that time period.”

“Yes! Tchaikovsky is believed to have been infatuated with a man when he wrote this symphony, and some argue that his death was an assisted suicide in response to evidence of this homosexuality. If we think in that mind, this entire piece has a much larger meaning, no?”

Ian flutters his fingers against his thigh, and takes in the words. He doesn’t understand the fuss; some dead person wrote a piece a century ago, and they’re supposed to make it their own? How can he make somebody else’s story his own? He’s never understood, always been frustrated to near-tears with the prospect of playing classical music. Everything comes out flat, unremarkable. Because it’s not _his._

A loud noise interrupts the gravitas of the moment, as the door bangs open and a guy rushes in, out of breath and disheveled, dressed in a plain white t-shirt and jeans, with a cherry brown messenger bag over his shoulder.

“Mikhailo,” Nowack greets, unimpressed. “So good of you to finally join us.”

The dim light of the classroom casts a shadow, but Ian could swear he’s seen that face once before. Maybe around the building, during orientation, or in passing, at his audition.

It hits him like a sudden wave of fever. It’s the guy that was at the bar, yesterday; crosswalk-coffee guy.

“Yeah, I, uh,” Mikhailo pants out, as he crosses the room, to the sleek black grand piano at the front. “Alarm. Didn’t go off.”

Ian has to swallow down a laugh, as he remembers watching Mikhailo leave last night with what could have been a sexy, hipster reincarnation of Paul Bunyan.  

“The point of being the teacher’s assistant, Mikhailo, is to attend the whole class and assist the teacher,” Dr. Nowack informs him in a resonant voice, before he lowers his volume considerably, though still loud enough for the class to hear. “This is part of your disciplinary action.”

“Yeah,” Mikhailo acknowledges, dropping his bag to the ground beside the piano and settling on the bench. “Wasn’t exactly on my agenda for today.”

“Well, I am overjoyed you chose to grace us with your presence,” Nowack bites, as Mikhailo shuffles through his bag and pulls out a mess of sheet music. “This piece,” the professor says, returning his attention to the class, “has twenty-five separate instruments that contribute to its synthesis. But what happens when you condense it down to an instrument that is not even in the original composition?”

A girl with curly, dirty blonde hair raises her hand, and does not wait to be called on. “You lose the full quality of the piece.”

Nowack cocks his head. “Do you?”

She flinches slightly. “Well, yes. You’re playing it in a way it wasn’t written to be played.”

“Hm.” The professor sucks his teeth, glancing over at the TA, who waits patiently now, elbow balanced on the music prop. “Mikhailo?” the professor prompts, and the guy raises an eyebrow, the picture of apathetic confidence. “Enlighten us.”

Mikhailo straightens and turns toward the music, inhaling slightly.

“And... _Andante,_ Mikhailo,” the professor directs softly, and Mikhailo poises his hands above the keys. “Et...commencer.”

The guy begins to play, softly and heartbreakingly, and Ian’s breath hitches. It’s smaller than what was just played, but it still contains every bit of feeling. It’s condensed, more intense. Everything is more distinct, but it sounds more hopeful. Like a memory, like what’s happening isn’t real, but maybe, _maybe_ it could be, and the thought is terrifying and enticing all at once. When it swells to the climax, Ian can almost see the plot of it, of the moment when the composer’s emotions boil over. And then it pulls back, into a slow resolution, like he’s given up, and is saying his bittersweet goodbyes.

It’s short, but when the guy holds the pedal down to allow the last chord to fade out, everyone in the room is completely still.

“Music,” the professor reiterates, voice cutting through the still-fading tones, “is relative. I wish to teach you how to utilize this.”

Ian’s eyes don’t leave Mikhailo, who removes his hands from the keys gently, the look of forlorn sincerity on his face a far cry from the panting, late mess that had stumbled in a few minutes ago. Something hollow tears its way into Ian’s chest; jealousy, he thinks.

Mikhailo is a performer.

“In this class,” Nowack continues, “you will be learning how to take a piece composed hundreds of years ago, and make it into something unique. Meaningful. Music is not rigid, as…” the man glances down at the clipboard in his hands, up at the curly-haired girl, down at the clipboard again, “ _Miss Fletching_ so narrowly believes.” The girl shrinks a little bit at the sound of her name and the professor takes a step towards her. “Miss Fletching, do you believe Mikhailo _‘lost the full quality of the piece’_ just now?”

The girl’s gaze darts between Nowack and the TA, who raises a challenging eyebrow at her. “No, I...his rendition was very beautiful,” she stutters out finally.

Nowack nods in approval, and Mikhailo makes a noise that could be a scoff.

“Very glad to see you’ve changed your opinion, Miss Fletching. Now,” Nowack’s eyes scan over the seating chart in his hands again. “I would like anyone who composes their own music to raise their hands.”

Hands shoot up eagerly around the room, but Ian hesitates. He can sense the storm behind the question, the deeper intention. After a second, he raises his hand anyway.

Nowack seems to skim down a list, as he mutters out last names inaudibly. Then his eyebrows raise as his finger stills next to a name. “Gallagher. Gallagher? Who’s Gallagher?”

Ian freezes, gut twisting, mouth growing slightly dry. He lowers his hand shakily. “Me,” he says weakly, before swallowing and trying again. “I’m Gallagher, sir. Ian.”

“You compose?” Nowack asks, venturing in Ian’s direction.

“Mostly improvisational, sir,” Ian answers. “But I’ve been working hard at mastering theory.”

Nowack makes a noise of skepticism in the back of his throat. “You received the full scholarship,” he observes, “for improvisational work?”

Ian nods with a swallow.

Nowack hums again, and then looks out at the class. “I would like all of you who compose your own music to have something from either the Baroque, Classical, or Romantic period prepared by this time next week.” A burst of murmuring ripples through the class, and Ian thinks he can see the TA stifling a laugh, with a hand to his mouth.

“And those of you,” Nowack continues, “that do _not_ compose their own music: I would like to hear each of you playing your best piece. Wednesday.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Ian can see Malone break into a grin.

“Now,” Nowack transitions, clapping his hands together, “let’s review the syllabus for this year.”

Ian spends the rest of the class wracking his brain for a piece, and shaking himself awake when his gaze drifts absently to the fidgeting TA, the only other focal point in the room.

It’s definitely the guy from the bar, Ian thinks. Even if his hair is considerably messier, and his eyes considerably more glazed over, it’s definitely him. But his mind just won’t seem to let him rest on that fact, pushing him to keep looking, keep thinking. Like there’s something else. Something older than New York, older than Juilliard, older than the pills and the rhythm and the cautiousness. But he’s never known anybody named Mikhailo; he would have remembered that.

He turns the name over in his mind a few times, like a measure of music he just can’t quite pick apart.

“And if you have any questions,” Nowack concludes, dragging Ian out of his thoughts, “don’t be afraid to ask my assistant, Mikhailo, who will do his best to give you an answer.”

“It’s Mickey,” the TA corrects pointedly, like this is an argument he’s had with Nowack a million times before.

Mickey.

Ian squints at the TA, taking in his features one more time: a strikingly delicate face, taken by a furrowed brow and a jaded disposition, balanced over a small, stocky body.

The next time he blinks, he sees a home, colorless and worn, ruled by fear. When he opens his eyes, he’s greeted by a jarring revelation.

_Mickey Milkovich?_

It all comes together, then, as he sees the boy he’d pined after for years, there, in the flesh, sitting behind a fucking Steinway, picking at his fingernails like living in New York and attending Juilliard bores him.

He looks good; in fact, he looks incredible. Clean. Tired, maybe, but not unhappy. Not scared out of his mind. Not like Ian remembers him.

He thinks back to yesterday, when he admitted to Carter that he’s still hung up on this exact person, and he can feel his neck flush.

“--and I will see you all on Wednesday! Come prepared to learn from each other!” Nowack turns his back on the class, and the shuffle to leave ensues, but Ian can’t seem to move.

“Are you alright, Ian?” Malone asks, standing and shouldering his bag.

Ian blinks a few times, his limbs feeling like stone. “Yeah, I…” He shakes himself minutely, and wills himself back into working order. “I just have a question for the teacher.” He looks up at Malone with a sweet smile. “Wait for me outside?”

Malone nods, returning the smile, and turns to follow the procession of students out of the classroom. Ian finally stands, inhaling to steady himself, before he approaches the front, where Mickey stands, shuffling through some sheet music.

“Uh, hey,” Ian greets uncertainly, with a small wave.

“Listen, I probably can’t answer any questions you’ve got for me,” Mickey sighs, eyes not leaving the papers in his hands. “Nowack just said that because he’s a dick.”

Ian glances over at the professor nervously to find him bent over papers on his desk; if the man did hear Mickey’s insult, he didn’t give a shit.

Mickey pauses what he’s doing when Ian doesn’t immediately speak, looking up at him with raised eyebrows. “Dude, do you need somethin’?”

“I, uh--” Ian strains to think of something to ask him, other than, ‘Remember that single time we fucked when you were probably blackout drunk? Because I certainly do!’

“Wait, haven’t I seen you before?” Mickey asks, squinting at him. He straightens, eyes widening, and Ian’s heart pounds as he realizes he’s been recognized. “You’re that asshole that poured scalding hot coffee down my back yesterday,” Mickey accuses, pointing at him.

Ian’s grip tightens on the strap of his bag as all fleeting thoughts of expressing full recognition and happy surprise fly out the window with the inflammatory tone. “Yeah,” he confirms, as if that’s what he meant to be talking about in the first place. “And you’re the asshole that came to a full stop directly in front of me at an empty crosswalk.”

“Bullshit that crosswalk was empty, you ruined one of my best shirts.”

“The hell do you want me to do, pay for it?”

“Mr. Gallagher,” Dr. Nowack’s voice cuts in, and Ian turns to find the man peering at the argument over his glasses. “A word?”

Ian takes one more second to exchange a glare with Mickey, before turning and treading to the professor’s desk. “Yes, sir?”

The corner of Nowack’s mouth twitches up the slightest bit at the respect. “I do hope you have something spectacular planned for next week’s evaluation, Mr. Gallagher. I’ll be disappointed if our scholarship holder...disappoints.”

Ian swallows, bouncing slightly on his heels, nervously. “I won’t disappoint,” he promises, paper-thin.

“Do you have something in mind?” Nowack asks, looking back down at the papers on his desk.

“Well, there’s a lot to choose from,” Ian lies, glancing over at Mickey, who has returned to his seat behind the piano. “But I’ll come up with something.”

Nowack’s face is unchangingly skeptical. “How were you trained, Mr. Gallagher?”

Ian’s mouth opens and closes a few times, at a loss as to what the correct answer to the question would be. “Well, I--I’m self-taught, mostly. I took a year of lessons, but we couldn’t--” Ian pauses, looking down at his feet. “--afford any more.”

“Well, until this year, nearly every recipient of that scholarship has been classically trained,” Nowack explains. He motions towards Mickey, who flips through a repertoire book, ignoring them. “Mikhailo, for example, has been training from age six. He was the recipient two years ago.”

_Age six?_

So neighborhood menace, tough-as-nails Mickey Milkovich had been, for the duration of the time that Ian had known him, a classical pianist? Something about it is profoundly strange, and he suddenly finds himself struggling to equate the boy from his childhood to the talented, straight-forward guy he sees now. Is that even Mickey Milkovich?

“I have my suspicions, Mr. Gallagher,” Nowack continues, drawing Ian’s attention back, “that your receival of this honor is a push for diversity.”

“Diversity?” Ian questions, eyebrows drawing together. “I’m white.”

“Smaller scale diversity,” Nowack corrects, setting down the pen in his hand and raising his head to look at Ian fully. “Diversity among backgrounds, among training.”

“Are you calling me a token, sir? A token poor kid?” Ian asks, defensiveness flaring in his chest.

Nowack raises an eyebrow. “You played an original piece in your audition, yes? It is common sense for most students not to push their original compositions immediately. But it was all you had, yes? And there has been a big outcry lately, that this school does not give self-taught ‘prodigies’ like yourself a chance. Because you have had no guidance to give you an appreciation for the classics.”

“That’s why I’m here, though,” Ian cuts in, jaw set. “To get the training that I could never have growing up. That’s why I’m here. I want to get better.”

“I do not doubt that, Mr. Gallagher.” Nowack fixes him with one more analytical stare. “I just hope that you are more than meets the eye.”

“I am,” Ian assures him.

“Good. So Monday, you show me.” Nowack picks the pen back up, and returns his attention to the papers. “Have a nice day, Mr. Gallagher.”

* * *

 

“Little hard on him,” Mickey comments, after the door thuds shut behind Ian.

“I saw his audition,” Nowack explains distantly. “He has raw talent. I just fear he might settle for a job as a lounge lizard.”

Mickey grunts, and lays out a short Liszt piece. “Mind if I play in between classes?”

Nowack motions for him to go ahead, and Mickey takes a breath, starting in on the piece, a slurring, dreamy thought.

When he plays, he finds it’s the best and worst time to think. Often times, when something is weighing on his mind, it helps to use expression as a release, to turn over his thoughts in a non-verbal way.

Right now, through the haze of Liszt, he’s thinking about how truly dumb he can be.

He saw Ian only after Nowack called out his name during the class, and the level of sheer fear that he felt was nearly ridiculous. He doesn’t even want to try to calculate what the odds are that Ian Gallagher, the same kid from down the street, the first boy he ever fucked, would end up in the same city halfway across the country, in the same fucking class that Mickey is assigned to assist with.

When Ian had approached him, he panicked. It all suddenly felt too focused and real, with Ian looking at him head-on, like that, in a way he hadn’t even back in Chicago.

Maybe that’s it, Mickey thinks. Maybe that’s what the feeling of dread and slight resentment is. He’s moved past Chicago; past what little family he left behind, past whatever he felt for Ian, past the impending failure of his name.

He never intends on returning home, and he never planned to encounter any reminders of it in New York.

Mickey transitions into the second section of the piece, a swell and a fall, an astute call for here and now.

Here and now, he thinks. Ian isn’t here and now. He is here, now, but just because Mickey knew him, at one point, just because he had some level of importance, doesn’t mean Mickey knows him now. Ian is the old days. Then and there. And looking at him makes the ink on his knuckles, the tattoos he hates so fucking much, burn with memory.

Just because Ian is here, Mickey thinks, doesn’t mean it’s a second chance at something. Because Mickey, he doesn’t believe in fate. He doesn’t believe in a higher power. He believes in hard work, and free will, and that’s what got them both there. Not some greater law of magnetism.

They deserve to live their own lives, away from their shitty childhoods, their shitty parents, the shitty hand life dealt them.

Mickey just doesn’t love Chicago, anymore.

He finishes the piece resolutely, without a flaw.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [](https://gll-vch.tumblr.com)  
>  judging by how slow writing this is going, expect this to be a long fic lmao. ik pretty much where i'm going with this, it's just a matter of getting there  
> also the second half of this has no editing as i wanted to post it before i left for work so i'm gonna edit it when i get home, enjoy what might be a mess.  
> i don't have much else to say, but comments make my day!


	3. Agitato

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter's kinda short but this thing is gonna be lengthy so i feel like it's ok  
> [playlist with all the songs](https://open.spotify.com/user/merishaw14/playlist/2OwnLseR6Vk2jhmoDeaxo4)

It’s Tuesday night when Ted calls Mickey. He’s sitting on the couch, reading a book about Johann Pachelbel for his  _ Music History  _ class while Jordan watches the newest episode of  _ Grey’s Anatomy _ , when an unknown number buzzes to life on the screen of his phone, and he, forgetting his two-day-old mistake, answers it.

“Yeah?”

“Hey. Is this Mickey?”

“Yeah,” Mickey answers absently. “Who’s this?”

“Ted,” the voice answers. “We... _ met  _ in the East Village on Sunday?”

Mickey sets the book down on his lap, as the memory of a black beard and everything surrounding it materializes before his mind’s eye. “Oh, shit. You’re actually callin’ me?”

“Yeah. Uh, is this a bad time?”

Mickey glances at his roommate, who remains absorbed in her shitty soap opera, and down at the book in his lap. “Yeah, I have an evening class in, like, three minutes,” he lies, and Jordan throws him a look, to which he responds with a middle finger in her general direction.

“Oh! Well, I’ll make this quick. I was wondering if we could get together again?”

Mickey rolls his eyes, head falling to rest on the back of the couch. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. But, as friends. Like, just to hang out. I get the impression you aren’t really into dating, right now.”

“You just want to hang out with me as a friend, after we’ve banged?” Mickey scrutinizes. 

“We could do that, too, if you’re interested. I’m open to anything.”

“So, you want to hang out, and fuck,” Mickey clarifies. “That sounds like a date.”

“Come on, I just want to get to know you better. I like you. I can’t stop thinking about Sunday.”

Mickey notices a sudden lack of background noise, and glances up to see that Jordan has paused the show and now watches him with an amused expression. 

“Whatever, man,” Mickey sighs. “Just text me a time and place and maybe I’ll show up, alright? I gotta go.”

“Alright! Good luck in class!”

“Uh huh. Bye.”

Mickey hangs up without waiting for a response, and tosses his phone to the side, picking his book back up. 

“Evening classes?” Jordan asks, cocking an eyebrow.

“If I hadn’t said that, he would have asked to come over,” Mickey answers, eyes skimming the page to find his place again.

“So you’re dating him.”

“He wants to be my friend,” Mickey corrects, heaving a sigh when Jordan tilts her head at him, eyes skeptical. “Who fuckin’ cares, anyway? I don’t want a boyfriend, but I can have people I bang.”

Jordan stares at him for a second more as he shifts uncomfortably, glaring defiantly at the page, until she finally shrugs and unpauses the show.

* * *

 

“So, what are you going to play tomorrow?” Ian asks Malone, as they sit on the ground, backs against the white wall, waiting for a free practice room.

Malone hums in thought, head tilted back to rest against the wall. “I’m not quite sure. I’m thinking about this Rachmaninoff piece. Very dramatic, and I played it for the Cincinnati competition, so I wouldn’t be wasting it on this. There’s this Agitato section that people love, too.” Malone reaches a hand out in front of him, fingers splayed, and stretches his fingers. “It’s not the hardest piece I know, but it will get me a good grade.”

“Yeah, I think I’m going to play a Burgmüller piece,” Ian sighs.

Malone’s eyebrows draw together as he rolls his head to look at Ian. “Burgmüller?”

Ian blinks at him. “Yeah. Friedrich Burgmüller. He--”

“No, I know who Burgmüller is,” Malone interrupts with a small laugh. “His music...it’s just mostly etudes, though. Right? Little character pieces.”

Ian shrugs. “I don’t know. I don’t really have your repertoire. I make my own shit.”

“Well, think of the hardest piece you’ve learned, and play that,” Malone suggests.

A piece immediately pops into his mind, when he considers the prompt. “I could play Sonata in C Major. Mozart.”

“First movement?”

“Only movement I know.”

Malone scratches the back of his head in thought. “I don’t know, mate. That piece is fairly demanding. Have you been practicing it?”

“Not lately, no,” Ian replies. “But I did play it in a talent show my junior year.”

“A talent show?” Malone smiles, dimples deep. “That’s cute.”

Ian grins, slapping Malone on the arm. A click sounds, and they look over at the door of the practice room in the middle as a stringy-haired blonde traipses out.

They glance at each other again, and Ian shifts his weight and stands, followed by Malone, before the blonde pauses to hold the door of the room for someone heading down the hall in the opposite direction.

“Hey, Mick,” the blonde calls out. “Thought they kicked you out.”

Ian snaps his gaze to the right, where Mickey strides down the hall, headed straight for the practice room. Ian tries to keep the cocktail of mild fear and irritation out of his outward expression.

“Fuck you, they kicked me out,” Mickey replies, with a smirk and a short nod. “You’re thinkin’ of Tom.”

“The guy you jumped?”

“For callin’ me a fag,” Mickey argues, stopping when he reaches the blonde, who remains halfway lodged in the door. “And I didn’t jump him, he went down in one hit.”

The blonde snickers. “Well, I’m glad you’re still around. Artsy types get harder to stomach every year.”

“Yeah. Thanks for clearin’ the room for me on time, too.” Mickey straightens the loose hoodie over his shoulders. “Now that they have me doin’ TA shit I barely have time to breathe if I don’t schedule every fuckin’ minute.”

“Sure thing, man,” the blonde assures, stepping out of the doorway and holding it open for Mickey to enter.

“Whoa,” Ian exclaims, pushing past the dryness in his throat, causing both guys to pause and look over at the pair, as if noticing them for the first time. “We’ve been waiting for twenty minutes, now.”

Mickey glances at the blonde, and then back at Malone, like he has no idea what the fuck Ian is upset about. “And?”

“So, we should get that room,” Malone explains. “Not you.”

The blonde barks out a laugh. “God, I love new kids.”

“Listen,” Mickey says, not backing away from the door. “I’ve been using this same room, at this same time, for three years now, and I’m not about to stop because some freshmen pricks think playground rules still fuckin’ apply.”

“Don’t you know who I am?” Malone demands, straightening, trying unsuccessfully to appear intimidating.

Ian can feel the situation slipping as Mickey eyes Malone up and down, unimpressed. “No.”

Malone scoffs. “I’m _Malone Ingham._ Concert pianist.”

Mickey stares at him incredulously, before throwing his hands up in exasperation. “I don’t fuckin’ have time for this,” he exclaims, moving to enter the practice room. Malone looks at Ian, then, clearly at a loss, and Ian rolls his eyes heavenward, clearing the space in three steps, grabbing onto the edge of the door to force it to stay open and staring Mickey down, an action that causes his heart to race, resounding in his throat.

Mickey Milkovich has ice blue eyes, he notices. Cynical, arrogant, cold fucking ice blue eyes.

“Back the fuck up,” Mickey warns, through gritted teeth.

“A girl is gonna leave that practice room in, like, two minutes,” the blonde points out. “And no one uses it until six.”

“Why the hell should we wait? Why can’t he wait for that room?” Ian insists, eyes not leaving Mickey’s.

Mickey smiles humorlessly, turning to face Ian fully. “Listen, you’re new, so I’ll explain this to you once: around here, we have a way of doing things. And we ain’t really in the business of rearranging our shit to accommodate fresh meat, alright? When Leslie Wu steps out that practice room, and you take it for an hour in between her time, and Kim Kelly’s time, that becomes your room, and your time. And then, next year, _you_ get to deal with freshmen tryin’ to take it. Catch me?”

Ian hates to admit it, and he tries not to let it seep into his features, but Mickey is making a slight amount of sense, even if he’s being a dick about it.

The door to the next room swings open, and a short girl in a Juilliard sweatshirt hustles out, eyes to the ground, causing Ian to finally glance away from Mickey. When he returns his gaze, Mickey raises his eyebrows and motions towards the room in a “What did I tell you?” fashion.

“Ian, let’s just use this one,” Malone decides, leaving the hall to claim the room.

Ian glares at Mickey for a few more seconds before turning to follow Malone, stopped when Mickey grabs onto his arm, pulling him back.

“Just a word of advice,” Mickey offers quietly. “Riding coattails around here doesn’t work out.”

Ian jerks his arm away, granting Mickey one final death stare before following Malone into the room.

“God!” Ian seeths, shutting the door resolutely behind them and turning to Malone, who already sits behind the piano. “I don’t remember him being such a fucking stuck-up dick.”

“You know him?”

Ian freezes, realizing what he’s admitted to.

_Fuck._

After a brief moment, in which he attempts to find anyway to cover up the glaring truth, he sighs tiredly. “Yeah. Back in Chicago, he was my best friend’s brother.”

“Did you fight back then?” Malone asks.

Ian’s brow furrows, as he fights off the vision of his past. Before, when Mickey would steal one or two things from the Kash and Grab, and Ian wouldn’t say anything because he saw how they lived. Mickey would stick around, sometimes, when Ian would hang out with Mandy.

He was funny, Ian remembers. Rough. But Ian liked him.

And then there was after, when Mickey would hurry out of any room Ian entered, barely even came home to the Milkovich house, stopped stealing from the Kash and Grab.

“Didn’t know him that well,” Ian half-lies. “His family was shit, though. Like, some really fucked up people. I didn’t grow up in the nice part of Chicago.”

“There seemed to be a lot of tension between you, is all,” Malone comments.

Ian can feel the back of his neck heat up, and he shakes his head. “Nah, I don’t--I don’t even think he remembers who I am.” Ian heaves in a breath, willing his racing heart to slow. “It doesn’t matter, anyway.”

Malone studies him for a second longer, and then shrugs. “May I start, then?”

Ian nods, with a slightly forced smile, and Malone turns back to the piano, and begins to practice.

As Malone moves, his playing more minute than the energy he displays onstage, Ian mulls over one thought alone: he cannot believe that Mickey Milkovich, of all people, doesn’t remember who he is.

* * *

“Mikhailo,” Nowack greets immediately, as Mickey enters the classroom on Wednesday morning, as he’s looking down at his phone, one hand on the strap of his bag. “I would like you to do something.”

Mickey stops short, glancing up from his phone. “It’s eight in the morning. I woke up an hour ago.”

Nowack stares at him over his glasses steadily. “Well, in that case, why do you not just go back home? Go back to bed? Come back whenever it is convenient?”

Mickey chews his bottom lip in brief thought, before shrugging and turning back toward the door.

“No, stop, no. No, Mikhailo,” Nowack calls out. “I need you to help me evaluate the students, today and Monday.”

Mickey turns back around and pulls a face. “Ain’t that your job?”

“I will be doing it, as well,” Nowack dictates. “But I am giving you the opportunity to scrutinize your peers. And determine who is competition, this year.”

“They’re freshmen,” Mickey argues. “You could tie both my hands behind my back so I can only play with my fuckin’ tongue and I’d still be better than most of them.”

“And normally, I would agree, Mikhailo, but this class is different.” Nowack taps his desk once, before pushing back and standing. “And if you do well in the competition this semester, they may consider ending your probation for the spring.”

Mickey huffs out a noise of surprise. “So, I wouldn’t have to be a TA all year? If I win the fall semester competition?”

“If you even place second or third,” Nowack explains, walking slowly around the desk to half-sit, half-lean on the edge. “They do not want to waste the time of a front-runner with grading papers and babysitting, Mikhailo. But while you still are here with me, you may as well study your competition, yes?”

Mickey can’t find a flaw in that argument. “Guess that’s not a bad plan.”

“And, Mikhailo, while you are working with me, I would like to give you private lessons,” Nowack continues, crossing his arms. His tone suggests it’s a command as opposed to an offer.

Mickey’s brow furrows at the generosity. “Why?

Nowack looks at him with the rare hint of a smile in his eyes. “Because you are talented, and unique. I believe you are the future. And I have not been wrong, before. So I like to make investments, where I can.”

Mickey opens his mouth, slightly shaken out of words, and finds himself saved from saying some dumb shit by the sound of the classroom door opening behind him.

He spins just in time to see Ian, once again looking down at his phone, coffee in hand, milliseconds from crashing into Mickey.

Ian’s curly-haired friend, _don’t-you-know-who-I-am_ kid, follows him in, mouth dropping open in preparation to shout a warning. He doesn’t act fast enough, though, before Ian is colliding with Mickey, this time face-first, coffee cup jumping up the slightest bit, out of his grip, before he catches it again, slimly avoiding a huge mess.

“Jesus!” Ian exclaims, hopping back a step.

“Would you fuckin’ watch where you’re goin’?” Mickey demands, quickly looking down at his clothes to be sure Monday’s accident hasn’t been repeated.

Ian’s jaw clenches, after his shocked expression dissolves, and he glares at Mickey. “Would you quit standing right where people walk? You fucking live in New York, you'd think you'd know to watch out for people.”

Mickey straightens, looking Ian in the eye. “Would you quit starin’ at your fuckin’ phone like you gotta memorize some nuclear launch code in the next two minutes and look at the people existing around you? Please? Fuck.”

Ian’s eyes flare, and his empty hand clenches into a fist at his side. “Would you--”

“Good morning, Gallagher, Ingham,” Nowack cuts in. “Take your seats, please.”

Ian snaps his mouth shut, eyes not leaving Mickey’s, and his friend, Malone if Mickey remembers correctly, takes him gently by the arm and leads him away, to their seats in the middle of the empty classroom. Mickey turns to stare them down, refusing to look away until Ian has dropped eye contact and sits, tensely, as his friend speaks to him in a quiet voice from the next seat.

“Mikhailo?” Mickey turns to the professor, raising his eyebrows and tilting his head. “Do not fight with the freshmen.”

“He fucking--”

“I do not care. Go play the Rachmaninoff piece you are working on until we start, so I do not have to hear their talking. Or yours.”

Mickey stares back steadily, before throwing his hands up with a scoff and complying, stalking to the piano, dropping his bag to the ground heavily and sitting down.

He doesn’t really have the piece consciously memorized, but in his current state of compressed irritation, he starts in on the Prelude in C Minor without retrieving the music, with a resentful, slow tempo. He fights hard to keep it soft, like it’s supposed to be in the first section, to increase the impact of the climax, when all he wants to do is play at a full, flat fortissimo to drown out the sound of Malone and Ian whispering to each other.

It is slightly satisfying when they shut up at the beginning of the Agitato section: an angry, heart-poundingly fast crash of dark noise, like a ship revolting against a stormy sea. He finds he remembers it surprisingly well, able to lean into the speed in a way that he can’t when he focuses on reading the music.

More students filter in, then, each growing silent when they enter, taking their seats quickly, but it always becomes like this, when he plays, tunnel-vision, a flood around him too strong to reach through and grab him out, and he continues on without thought, into a bright, maniacal penultimate section, the noise swelling in his chest, booming even with the shitty acoustics of the classroom.

He lingers on the final notes, his mind remaining blank save for the conflict of the major and the minor. When he finally removes his hands from the keys, the classroom is full, and when he glances out towards them, he finds almost every eye trained on him, including Ian’s, whose expression has changed from one of anger to something almost nervous. Still resentful, but his confidence, overflowing just minutes ago, seems to have been swallowed down.

“I did not realize you had memorized the piece,” Nowack comments absently, as if they are the only two in the room.

“I didn’t,” Mickey mutters through gritted teeth, still breathing through the adrenaline.

Fucking Ian Gallagher.

He doesn’t understand why he’s feeling so easily annoyed, again, like he always felt back in Chicago. Maybe because Ian is just drenched with thoughts of home, and that’s why every interaction with him thus far has felt like they’re engaging in something unnatural, against the laws of space and time.

Whatever it is, Mickey fucking hates it. And, by association, he fucking hates Ian Gallagher.

And honestly, thinking back, when they were in Chicago, Mickey doesn’t think he liked Ian back then, either. He was too smiley, and quiet, and his family fucking sucked. Mickey remembers his brother, Lip: a pretentious asshole that charged people money for his mediocre English papers. And the dad, Frank, a piece of shit addict that had put Mickey’s father, and, by extension, Mickey, through a lot of trouble when he would disappear without paying for his shit.

And, Mickey remembers, he had to start lifting from a different store than the Kash and Grab, because Ian was always there, and being around him was like torture.

And yeah, they fucked, but was it really as good as he remembers it being? Was it? Or does he just remember it to be so incomparable because it was his first time with a guy? Because he was just that perfect amount of drunk?

And, all that aside, Ian doesn’t even seem to fucking remember him, the vapid prick.

He stands, pushing away from the piano, ignoring the feeling of twenty-some pairs of eyes watching him, and he retreats to the chair beside Nowack’s desk, slouching down and crossing his arms, waiting for the professor to start.

“You have shaken their confidence,” Nowack whispers to him, as the class slowly, uncertainly begins to talk. “Thank you.”

Mickey glances at Nowack wordlessly, the tight pensiveness of his face softening slightly as he thinks about what the professor has said. He looks out at the class again, some of whom mutter indiscriminately, others who feverishly flip through sheet music of their own.

Mickey swallows, trying to ignore the tinge of guilt that comes with the praise, because he remembers being a freshman here: scared out of his mind, overcompensating for insecurity, unwilling to take criticism. He thinks he must have considered dropping out at least twenty times a week. He remembers hating the upperclassmen, because they were better, less bothered, more focused on improvement than bravado. He missed home, too, in his own way. He missed Mr. Bracher, and counting his steps on his walk home from school until he lost the number to his thoughts. He missed familiar faces, like his sister, and his teachers, and even, God forgive him, Ian.

He blinks back out at the class again, with a new tint to his perception, and he sees them for what they are: a bunch of insecure teenagers.

But the arts are competitive, he reasons. No one ever went soft on him. He shouldn’t feel bad for showing these kids they aren’t shit, yet. He shouldn’t feel bad that Nowack is using him to keep them in line. In fact, he should probably feel validated.

“Alright, ladies and gentlemen, let’s begin,” Nowack calls, standing from his desk and adjusting his glasses. “I have marked down those of you who will be evaluated today, and you will perform in alphabetical order. When I call your last name, approach the piano and state the piece that you will be playing. And please--” Nowack pauses, to sweep the class with a tired, challenging eye. “Don’t be the worst.”

Mickey sits back, sighing when Nowack hands him a pad of paper, instructing him to take notes.

A gangly, dark-skinned kid named Dalton tucks into a Scarlatti piece, and Mickey notes that he has good rhythm in the first ten seconds and only half-listens to the rest of his performance.

He chances a glance towards the middle of the class, where Ian and his friend Malone sit, and the color seems to have been drained from Malone’s warm complexion. Ian leans over towards him, whispering something as Malone seems to blink through whatever he’s thinking.

Mickey looks away, back towards Dalton, who finishes his piece pensively, removing his hands from the piano gently and sitting on the sound for a few seconds before renouncing it.

“Boring choice, Abent,” Nowack comments, with an emphasizing, nonplussed tone. “But, well-executed, technically. Mikhailo?”

Mickey jolts minutely, swinging his gaze over to the professor in surprise. “You want my opinion?”

“That is why I gave you the notepad, Mikhailo,” Nowack answers. “It is not for you to doodle on.”

Mickey swallows, internally acknowledging that he did not, in fact, pay attention well enough to give a solid critique. “Well, you kept time pretty good,” he begins, hesitating a bit, glancing out at the freshmen. He feels a second flood of apprehension, slight guilt, at his part in wearing these kids down.

He thinks of Mr. Bracher, then, and remembers his old teacher’s own blunt, effective way of instruction.

When he looks back at Dalton, he locks eyes with the guy, noticing his indignant glare of challenge.

_You know what? Fuck it._

“Nowack’s right,” Mickey says, tossing the notepad onto the desk. “You had the right tempo, the ornaments stayed in time, but that was boring. I stopped listening after, like, the first second. And it was your fault. Just because something is Baroque doesn’t mean it’s gotta be flat. That’s why we use pianos instead of harpsichords, now. Just because you don’t use rubato, doesn’t mean you can’t have some expression.” Mickey pauses, taking a breath, and then releasing the rest on a sigh. “Overall, though, it was just a bad choice. That can’t be the most impressive thing you play.”

“We were only given two days,” Dalton argues, standing.

“Take a look at where you are,” Mickey responds calmly, gesturing vaguely around the classroom. “If you don’t have your shit together before the first class, you’re behind.”

“Well said, Mikhailo,” Nowack agrees with a nod. “Go sit down, Abent.” The following quiet is pierced by the sound of whispering, towards which Nowack’s attention snaps. “Gallagher. Ingham. Do you have something to contribute?”

Mickey looks at the pair, who share a glance as Malone shakes his head and Ian tenses, growing silent.

“Well, Ingham, if you have nothing to say about Abent’s performance, why don’t you perform for us next?” Nowack suggests.

Malone seems to grow even paler. “I--I can’t, sir.”

Nowack’s eyebrows shoot up in surprise. “Can’t you?”

“No,” Malone answers. He gestures toward Mickey. “He already played the piece I’ve prepared. Before the class started.”

Mickey and Nowack share a critical glance. “What is your point, Ingham?” Nowack inquires.

“Well, I can’t play a piece that’s already been played, see? Everybody’s already heard it.”

Mickey laughs, tongue pressed into his cheek, and Nowack nearly cracks a smile.

“Ingham,” Nowack says sharply. “Are you, a concert pianist, afraid that you cannot outperform Mikhailo?”

“I just seems unfair,” Malone argues shakily. “He’s a third year student.”

“And he will be competing against you in the fall term competition,” Nowack cuts in. “So maybe now is a good time to begin practicing, yes?”

Malone swallows, hesitating for a moment before standing uncertainly and heading toward the piano. He settles down without music, glancing at the keys like he’s never seen them before, placing his fingers in position gingerly.

His starting tempo is much faster than traditionally played, as if he’s itching to finish it already, and he keeps the notes at mezzo-piano, instead of pianissimo.

When he transitions into the Agitato section, he almost seems to slow down, stuttering over a few passages, abandoning the illusion of the piece.

When he reaches the fortissimo pinnacle, he nearly powers through without a mistake, before the last measure before the diminuendo, in which he plays four consecutive, slightly sour notes.

He ends the piece with a passionless six measures.

“Well,” Nowack asserts before Malone has even lifted the pedal. “That was certainly not how Rachmaninoff meant for that to be played.” A ripple of unsure laughter passes through the class.

“Yeah, your tempo and dynamics were way off, man,” Mickey says, near apologetic. He never meant to humiliate the guy, but he did expect better from someone that holds his own name in such high regard. “And Rachmaninoff was barely part of the Romantic period. I mean, you completed the assignment on a technicality.”

“Mikhailo is too kind,” Nowack contributes. “That was atrocious. How are you a performer if you are so in your own mind?”

Malone gestures toward Mickey. “But he--”

“It should not matter,” Nowack interrupts. “He played it better. That is the only fact here. You failed to play it correctly. A performer must learn to remain unshaken by things around him.”

“But--”

Nowack waves him off, looking down at the list on his desk. “No more. We will move on, now. Who is Abigail Bennett?”

Malone snaps his mouth shut, eyes shining in silent protest, before he retreats to his seat, accepting a sympathetic look from Ian.

Mickey casts his gaze heavenward as the next student, a frizzy-haired redhead, announces her piece.

He spends the rest of the class pouring his attention into helping Nowack critique, and ignoring the obvious, dead-set glare that Malone keeps sending his way.

At the end, as the rest of the students filter out, Mickey retrieves the notes he took from his last class, _Music Theory III_ , and reads back through them absently. He vaguely registers the sound of footsteps echoing his way, but he refuses to look up in hopes that whoever it is will just leave him the fuck alone.

“Did you do that on purpose?”

Mickey glances away from his notes tiredly, towards the voice, to find Malone, looking defiant. “‘Scuse me?”

“That, stealing my piece, was that sabotage?” Malone insists, clutching his sheet music. Ian leans against a desk behind them, arms crossed.

“How the fuck would I have stolen it?” Mickey demands. “I don’t even know you, let alone what song you chose for some stupid fuckin’ scare tactic evaluation. Besides, I’m not a student in this class. I’m the fuckin’ TA.” Mickey directs his attention away from Malone, back to the notes, attempting to signify the end of the discussion.

“It just seemed unfair that you, a third year, should be allowed to play in a first year class--”

“Are you afraid of competition?” Mickey cuts him off, snapping his gaze back up towards him. “Because, just gonna tell you now, that’s all this school is about. You’re gonna have to compete, sometimes. _Most_ of the fuckin’ time, actually. ‘Gainst everyone you know.” Mickey gestures towards Ian, trying not to let his eyes linger on the redhead’s stony expression. “‘Gainst your fuckin’ boyfriend, too.”

“Not his boyfriend,” Ian chimes in solidly.

“Don’t care,” Mickey quips back.

“I’m not afraid of competition,” Malone scoffs, ignoring Ian, as Mickey flips a page of his notes. “I won the World Piano Competition.”

“Were you the reason they went bankrupt?” Mickey muses, without glancing up. Malone is silent for a beat, and when Mickey finally spares him a moment of attention, he finds the guy’s mouth moving wordlessly, struggling to form a rebuttal. Mickey sighs. “Look, if you’re not willing to learn anything, you should just drop out. Go back to fuckin’...Ireland, or whatever.”

“I’m from England,” Malone corrects, as if it matters.

“Whatever,” Mickey repeats. “My point is, this ain’t some fuckin’ movie, and you ain’t special. Either you try to learn something, or you’re gonna be fuckin’ miserable. I don’t care which you pick, just don’t take it out on me when you don’t do perfect.”

“I just don’t understand why you had to embarrass me, and everyone else,” Malone argues. “You’re rude for no reason.”

Mickey stares up at him, hand pausing on the edge of the next page of notes. “My job was to critique you. I psyched you out, _on accident_ , and you did shitty. So I told you that you did shitty, just like I did with everyone else that did shitty. Have none of your teachers been honest with you, before?”

“Of course they have, they’ve just been graceful about it. A word you seem to be unable to grasp,” Malone says with a sniff.

Mickey raises his eyebrows, and glances over at Ian shortly, who seems to have an unexplicable ghost of a smile on his lips. He looks back at Malone steadily. “Well, that ain’t how I do things. Or how Nowack does things, for that matter. If you can’t handle that, I suggest you transfer to a different class while you still can.”

“I don’t--”

“Look, I got a million things to do today, and strokin’ your ego isn’t one of them,” Mickey interrupts, flipping his notes shut and standing. “So, for the love of Christ, could you and your fuckin' bodyguard please leave me alone?” He shoves his notes in his bag, slinging it over his shoulder, suddenly desperate for another dose of caffeine to quell the headache blooming in the center of his skull. “The fuck are you smilin’ at, Red?” he mumbles as he passes Ian, who lowers his eyes and shrugs, smile not shrinking. Mickey pushes out of the classroom, into the long, windowed corridor, and takes a calming breath.

Yeah. He never liked Ian Gallagher.

* * *

“ _ God _ ,” Malone storms, tossing his bag onto the couch and sitting heavily next to it. “I have never met anybody more difficult in my entire life.”

“Well, I mean, you didn’t do perfect,” Ian reminds him tentatively, retreating to the kitchen for a glass of water. “He has a point.”

“He has a point?” Malone repeats incredulously. “You think I’m a spoiled brat?”

“No,” Ian assures, hurrying to join him on the couch, setting his glass down on the coffee table. “I think you’re used to being the best. Because you’re really good. But, so is everyone else, now.”

“So, now I’m average,” Malone sighs, leaning forward to bury his face in his hands.

“Not at all,” Ian protests, hesitantly placing a hand on Malone’s back in comfort. “I just think...you weren’t ready to compete, today. And, you know, Mickey’s been here for three years. He’s bound to have learned something.”

In all honesty, Ian can’t get Mickey’s performance of the piece out of his head; not only the melody, but the vision of it, too. As affrontingly abysmal as he finds Mickey’s personality to be, his playing is what Ian has always dreamed of achieving. With that in mind, he can already feel himself inspired to work harder, if only to reach a single goal: to be better than Mickey Milkovich.

“He really is awful, though, isn’t he?” Malone says after a second, raising his head, with a small, wet laugh.

Ian laughs shortly, too. “He really is.” 

Malone sobers, suddenly, before huffing out a sigh. “God, I just feel like such an idiot. How could I do so poorly? I’m the most experienced person there. They offered me a position to do exactly what he’s doing.”

Ian’s eyes wander around the apartment, as he tries to think of something to say in comfort. “Hey,” he finally says softly, rubbing Malone’s back gently. “We should make a pact.”

Malone sniffs, turning his head to meet Ian’s eye. “A pact?” 

Ian adjusts his arm to drape over Malone’s shoulders. “Yeah. Before he graduates, we are gonna kick the  _ shit  _ out of Mickey Milkovich.” He pauses, turning that sentence over in his mind, as Malone squints at him in confusion. “No,” he corrects himself. “I meant--we’re gonna beat him at a competition, or something. We’re not gonna--we aren’t gonna beat him up.”

Malone laughs, smiling down at his lap. “Alright. I’ll make that pact.”

“Good. It’s a deal.”

“Ian,” Malone says in an odd tone, and Ian directs his gaze towards him, blinking at the sight of gray eyes. “Would you like to go on a date with me, sometime?”

Ian’s eyebrows jump in surprise, but Malone’s earnest expression holds him in place. “Seriously?”

Malone shrugs, gaze flitting away from Ian’s, suddenly shy. “Yes.”

Ian grants him a smile and thinks, for a second.

Malone is his roommate, for one thing, and any bad blood between them would be magnified by their living situation.

On the other hand, his face is almost perfectly symmetrical.

Besides, who knows how many people have passed on dating their soulmate simply out of fear of it going wrong down the road? Ian certainly doesn’t want to be one of those people.

“Alright,” he agrees, after a moment, and Malone grins. “I’d love to.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nowack is so awful i love writing him so much  
> also, using relationships with separate characters as a plot device like god and the shamey writers intended  
> please comment any thoughts! negative or positive! i love it all!  
> [gll-vch.tumblr.com](https://gll-vch.tumblr.com)


	4. Impromptu

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> what? an update? in this month of august?  
> really though, i'm sorry, my life's been insane and kinda dramatic lately, idk.  
> this isn't edited in any way, and i've been having Big Trouble writing it, which i'm hoping will pass. but i did it. even if i wish i could have filled it out a bit better, i really didn't have it in me, and i wanted to get an update out. so here it is!  
> [playlist with the songs](https://open.spotify.com/user/merishaw14/playlist/2OwnLseR6Vk2jhmoDeaxo4)

Ian glares at the piece in front of him, the sound-proof silence of the practice room deafening.

He’s managed to score a time (four to five p.m. in the room farthest from the hallway) but that’s all meaningless if he gets kicked out for sucking as hard as he has been for the past two days. His fingers ache with each passage, his left hand is uneven, and he’s not even close to the right tempo.

It’s such an agile piece, and Ian could swear he’s composed pieces just like it on his own and had no trouble playing them.

It’s just so fucking frustrating to play other people’s music.

He wants to create. He stares down at his hands, fingers twitching silently on the keys, and he just wants to forget the fucking Mozart and play, really play, the way he wants to.

He stares the streaks of sixteenth notes down, and tries to revert back to his junior year, when he played this music from Hell for an audience.

He hated it then, too, he realizes.

He takes a breath, fingers already splayed in their starting position, and he begins the piece again, for the fifth time in an hour. He breezes past the first few measures easily, starting in on the first scale passage heavily and spitefully: the exact opposite of how it’s supposed to be played, from Ian’s understanding.

It’s such a delightful, light, sunny piece, and after Monday, Ian hopes that he never so much as hears Mozart’s name again.

He skips the repeat, to spare his buzzing fingertips, and he stops abruptly with a groan of frustration when he botches the next figure. He looks over at the clock above the door, almost relieved to find it to be nearly five o’clock. He gathers his music, shoving it in his bag and closing the lid of the piano aggressively.

Fuck, does he hate Mozart.

His tension seems to coil further into a nervousness when he opens the door to find Malone, sitting on the floor with headphones on, waiting for his hour.

“Hey,” Ian greets with a small wave. “What’s up?”

Malone’s expression brightens as he pauses his music and slips off the headphones. “Hey! Are you working Monday night?”

“No, I think I work Tuesday through Friday next week,” Ian says, pausing in front of his roommate.

“I was just wondering if we could have that date,” Malone explains with smiling eyes. “There’s this lounge on Greenwich that I’ve been curious about.”

Ian adjusts the strap of his bag and hooks his thumb in his pocket. “Yeah. Okay.”

Malone’s eyebrows twitch up. “Your enthusiasm is stammering.”

Ian smiles tightly, trying to swallow down the lingering frustration in his temples. “Sorry, I’m just really hung up on this fuckin’ Mozart piece. I don’t know if I’m gonna have it down before Monday. And I really don’t want to--”

The sound of a door opening behind them cuts him off, as Leslie Wu vacates Malone’s room and Malone stands. “Well, there’s not much you can do but practice,” Malone rushes out. “So, see you back at the flat, after six? We can make our plans then.”

Ian looks at him for a second, mouth still prepared to form his next syllable, before he closes his lips and nods, with a small smile. “Sure. Lookin’ forward to it.”

Malone grins, taking a step closer and pecking Ian on the cheek. “We’ll talk more then.”

Malone waves, over his shoulder, before disappearing into the practice room, leaving Ian, once again, to the quiet.

“Thought he wasn’t your boyfriend.”

Ian nearly jumps out of his skin, as he snaps towards the voice. Tucked in a corner, with an open binder balanced on his lap, is Mickey, presumably waiting for his room to open. Ian straightens, blinking through the initial jolt. “Thought you didn’t care.”

Mickey shrugs, flipping a page in the binder pointedly, not looking up. “Don’t.”

Ian’s gaze lingers, for a second longer, and the tension in his chest seems to melt, halfway, as he looks at the ghost of the boy he knew. He draws in a breath, holds it in. He isn’t sure what he’s trying to release on his impending exhale.

Mickey’s eyes flick up to Ian, expression waxing from blank, to something troubled and undecipherable. His lips part, as if he’s on the verge of a realization, and a rattling panic takes hold of Ian’s bones.

What the fuck is he supposed to do, if Mickey recognizes him? What kind of conversation is that supposed to be?

He grips the strap of his bag so hard, he swears he loses sensation in his fingertips, for a second.

The sudden bang of a door seems to snap Mickey out of it, who closes his binder quickly and leaps up, hustling past Ian without another glance.

“Hey, Mick,” the blonde from Tuesday greets with a grin.

“Fuck off, Reginald,” Mickey mumbles, pushing past him, causing him to stumble back a bit.

Reginald throws his hands to the side as the door clicks shut, looking at Ian in confusion. “What did I do to deserve that?”

Ian shakes his head, bridge of his nose buzzing in the aftermath, and the tension of the moment curdles into resentment as he adjusts his bag and starts down the hallway.

He’s been trying to put a finger on what this weight, sinking in his chest and dripping down off his fingertips, is.

Frustration. God, frustration. Not with Mickey, specifically, maybe.

When he left Chicago, months ago, he remembers watching the skyline shrink, shifting his bag and hearing the faint rattle of his pills, and feeling hopeful. Intrigued with life, again. Like the big break in routine, the renouncement of everything he knew, might make trying, managing, marching, a little bit more worth it.

He left Chicago because he wanted to. Because every corner by the time he left, reminded him of his father’s apathy, his mother’s absence, his own insanity. And Mickey, Mickey _is_ Chicago. No matter how seamlessly he’s sunk into New York, no matter how it might seem to anybody else, Ian can see it, the ghost of his hometown’s dirt and the glint of steel that sparks a twist in his gut. He can hear the gravel timbre of familiar streets when Mickey opens his mouth, and his mind reaches, so desperately, toward a complete, fresh start, but there he is, him, that one big blemish on an otherwise clean slate.

He sinks into a haze, and half expects to be released to the ashy brown of his old neighborhood, rattled out of his thoughts by the sharp, chrome edges of his new home.

* * *

 

Mickey sits down behind the piano, throwing his bag down with the stunted force of frustration.

Ian Gallagher may not currently be on his good side, but his boyfriend, the British douchebag, is most definitely on his worst side.

Mickey can see him for what he is: a self-absorbed, molly-coddled, delusional diva, praised for being young in an arena of silver foxes.

But Mickey sees better, and younger, performers than Malone Ingham every day. People who have poured blood, sweat, and tears into their art and still remain completely under the radar. People who deserve much more than they will ever be given, because everything good is heaped onto privileged, prissy assholes like Malone.

Furthermore, as much as he does not like Ian, nobody deserves to be sucked into being a narcissist’s single groupie under the guise of a relationship. He knows if he doesn’t look away from the whole, cascading mess, he’ll have the displeasure of watching the life be slowly sucked from Ian’s eyes.

But, whatever. That’s not his problem. All he has to do is turn his head.

His phone buzzes as he reaches for his bag, not entirely sure what he wants to practice, and he puffs out a breath when he sees it’s from Ted.

_Monday at 7 at the Kaleido on Greenwich?_

He sighs deeply, as his thumb hovers over the keyboard. He doesn’t know what the fuck “the Kaleido” is, but he did tell Ted that he would consider hanging out again, and he’s nothing if not a man of his word.

He quickly taps out a response.

_might be free_

He places his phone on the bench next to him, and retrieves the first piece of music his fingers touch: a Chopin concerto, from his time back in Chicago.

_Weird._

He hasn’t thought about this piece in years, since he learned it his junior year of high school.

It’s soft, and optimistic, and romantic; a complete contrast to how he currently feels.

The last thing he wants to do is think about his hometown more than he has in the past week, and he knows the intensity of song-summoned memory, but his hands ignore his mind, and he places the music on the ledge and takes a breath, vaguely recalling the orchestral accompaniment that might have backed him, had he performed it as it was meant to be presented.

He starts, hesitantly, and even the first few measures bring back the thought of his old home, his old school, his old self.

He feels no longing for Chicago, he thinks. Not Chicago itself. Maybe to see his sister, again, or his old instructor. But the sting, the sulfur desolation of his childhood has never sparked nostalgia.

He remembers his life, vividly, when he was learning this piece.

His mother. His mother was alive, wasn’t she? Just barely. Maybe it was halfway through his progress that she phased out. Maybe that’s why the melody is making him nauseous, taking him back to his father’s apathy and his slurred, trembling spiral.

He was supposed to drop out of school. Stay behind, surrender to tradition.

He hated this piece. He’d forgotten how much, until now. He’d refused to practice it, for so long. What had made him try again? What was it?

Was it Mr. Bracher? He remembers now, a rainy night, as he stumbled through the piece for the hundredth lesson, when the man had stopped him and told him, in simple words, that if he was going to let his situation kill his art, then he would no longer receive lessons.

Mr. Bracher. He hasn’t called in a long time.

He ends the piece, remembers the tender conclusion he had practiced so fervently, and reaches for his phone again, unlocking it and finding Mr. Bracher’s number, pressing call without hesitation.

He’s not sure what he wants to talk about. Maybe he just wants to talk.

It rings once, twice, three times. It rings until a click sounds, and he is told to leave a message.

It beeps, and Mickey clears his throat. “Hey, Mr. B. It’s been a while. You’re probably busy, or somethin’. With your family. Just wonderin’ how you are. If you’re still in Chicago. I, uh, played an old piece, and thought of you. Realized I haven’t called in a fuckin’ while…” He trails off, licking his lips in thought. “Someone from back home is here, now. You probably knew him, he was, like, two grades under me. And it’s got me thinkin’ a lot about...you know, back home. Mandy, and you, and everyone. I, uh…” He taps his left fingers on the leather of the bench, and tries to gather his thoughts. “I don’t know. Everything just moves real fast around here. Months can go by and it feels like a week, at the most. So don’t, uh, don’t think I forgot about you, or anyone.” He exhales, and glances absently to the dull white of the wall. “Anyways. Call soon. Got a lot to tell you. Good stuff. I’m doin’ good, Mr. B. Uh...Yeah. Yeah.” He pauses, before he pulls the phone away from his ear and hangs up, a new tightness in his chest. He wonders if that’s why seeing Ian bothers him so much. Because it reminds him, with no uncertainty, about what a huge leap he took, for himself. About what, and who, he renounced to get here.

He really, really left everything.

He shudders out a breath, and sets his phone back down, blinking away the sting in his eyes and reaching again, for his bag, to find the piece that Nowack has given him to learn next.

* * *

 

Ian pushes into his apartment, letting the door fall shut behind him, to find Carter on the couch, looking at him over a book about the art of method acting.

Carter squints at him as he sets his bag down beside the door. “Who pissed in _your_ drink?”

“The fuck do you mean?” Ian asks, stalking to the kitchen for a glass of water.

“You look like some homeless dude spit in your face on the way home,” Carter observes.

“Fuckin’ astute,” Ian mumbles, as he turns on the tap.

“So?” Carter asks, closing his book as Ian walks back into the lounge, joining him on the couch. “Talk to me.”

Ian sighs, with a slight groan. “I just have that evaluation coming up, in my classical performance class. And shit’s already piling up from my other classes. Like, I have reading to do for my theory class, and my music history class. It’s a lot.”

“Well, at least you have Malone in your classes,” Carter reminds him. “You have a friend.”

Ian shrugs, focusing on a stray string on his jeans.

“And how’s that been going?” Carter asks, with a grin. He elbows Ian lightly. “You know he likes you.”

“Actually, we have a date,” Ian says. “The Kaleido, on Monday night.”

Carter gasps, slapping Ian’s arm. “You didn’t tell me!”

Ian shrugs absently, and reclines, half-tempted to shut his eyes.

“Christ,” Carter says. “Calm down, don’t wanna have a coronary from excitement.”

Ian rolls his eyes. “Leave it, Carter.”

“Why are you acting so wishy-washy, man? He’s practically a celebrity. And you’re going on a date with him.”

“It’s not about Malone,” Ian insists. “He’s great.”

“Well, then,” Carter prods. “What the hell is it about?”

Ian ignores him, for a moment, focusing intensely on the loose string, before he can’t stand it anymore.

He has to tell somebody.

“Alright. But you can’t make a big deal,” Ian warns. “I’m dating Malone.”

“When have I ever made a big deal?” Carter scoffs. Ian throws him a look filled with every single cold, hard fact that might answer that question, and Carter surrenders. “Whatever. Just tell me.”

Ian takes in a big, tired breath. “So, you remember that guy I was talking about, from back home?”

Carter’s gaze drifts to the side, and then snaps back. “The guy you had sex with once? And then got hung up on for years?”

Ian blinks. When it’s put like that, it sounds fucking ridiculous. “Yeah.”

“Yeah,” Carter confirms. “What about him?”

Ian sways a bit, wondering if he’ll regret saying anything about this to anyone. “That guy...is my music performance TA.”

Carter stares at him blankly, for a few seconds, and Ian can almost see the gears turning, until his mouth finally drops open absurdly. “Wait, he’s at _Juilliard_?”

“Yes,” Ian says. “But he’s not how I remember him, okay? He’s all...fuckin’ grown up, and he doesn’t even know who I am, so shit’s moot.”

“No,” Carter protests. “No, shit is certainly not moot. This is the universe, man. The goddamn _universe._ You need to talk to him.”

“What about ‘I’m dating Malone,’ did you not understand?” Ian demands, and Carter rolls his eyes to the ceiling. “And I _have_ talked to him,” Ian continues. “I spilled coffee down his back the day Malone moved in. Remember that? We aren’t on good terms.”

“So?” Carter insists. “Dude, fate’s handing you an epic love story on a goddamn silver platter.”

“No,” Ian objects. “It’s not like that, alright? It’s like…” He stops, taps his fingers on the cushion a few times. “Every time I see him, I think of home. And I’m tired of it, already. Being around him makes me feel, like, nauseous.”

“So, then...you’re not actually still in love with him,” Carter deduces.

“I never was in love with him,” Ian corrects. “I barely knew him.”

“So...what’s the point, then?” Carter asks. “What do you want to do, about it?”

“I don’t know,” Ian exhales. “Maybe I’ll drop out of the class. Change professors.”

“Don’t do that,” Carter says. “Then you won’t be with Malone, right?”

Ian falls back, to slouch against the cushions. “I guess.”

Carter pats his arm amicably. “It’s only for one semester, dude. Just get through the class, then you’ll only see him around every once in a while. I’m sure you’ll get used to him again, anyway. It’s only been a few days, anyway.”

Ian smiles weakly. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right. Thanks, Carter.”

Carter grins. “‘Course. You really do have the worst luck in the world, huh?”

Ian huffs out a laugh of agreement. “You have no idea.”

* * *

 

It’s 9:30 AM. Monday.

“Gallagher, you’re next.”

The world around Ian seems to slow to an agonizing pace, his eyes moving at a snail’s speed to Nowack.

He isn’t ready. He isn’t near ready. He needs more time. _A lot_ more time.

He can feel sickening adrenaline, the debilitating kind, rushing through his chest. His fingers ache with dread as he thinks of the punishing pace he’s been working toward all week. He glances to the heavens, shooting off something resembling a prayer, that God might work a miracle and magically make his fingers do what they’re supposed to do.

“Gallagher? Have you suddenly gone deaf?”

He feels a pressure on his arm as Malone reaches over and taps him gently, and his shakes out of his fear, if only slightly.  “Uh, no. Yeah.” He stands quickly, clutching his music in hand, and makes his way reluctantly to the front.

He takes his time arranging his music, after sitting down: four sheets, spread minimally to void the need for flipping pages. God knows he couldn’t do that and come out the other side alive.

“The class is only forty-five minutes, Mr. Gallagher,” Nowack reminds him, and Ian nods, getting the hint.

There’s nothing he can do, now. This is it.

He takes a breath, like he’s seen everyone do before him, and tries to push away all the dread, reaching for that carefree, light mood the piece was written to convey.

He can feel, as he starts, that he is going too fast in his nervousness, but he continues on with the tempo, throwing all his focus into just playing the right notes, expression be damned. He can feel the flat, forced dynamics sink into his fingertips with every new measure, and he can feel himself sweat the slightest bit when he makes his first technical error, at the very end of the first section.

_Shit._

He powers on, breathing through the mistake and trying to keep his thoughts straight, but he can feel his fingers stinging already with the effort, what little, hopeful confidence he had slipping.

It wasn’t enough time. It just wasn’t enough time.

He transitions into the second, minor section, with little agility.

Though, he thinks, everyone who has played before him has done well enough. Those other, self-proclaimed composers were perfectly comfortable preparing a piece to perform. It makes him think, reluctantly, that this all must be one big mistake. That he would have a scholarship, here, when he can’t do something as simple as play an intermediate Mozart piece correctly.

He rushes to finish, the performance objectively unreconcilable, and there is a pause after he releases the last note. Not a hush. Not a moment of amazement. He remembers last week, after Mickey played that huge piece, the same piece Malone played, the silence after he finished, of speechlessness.

This is a pause. Of disappointment.

“Gallagher?”

Ian looks up from the keys dully, barely able to meet Nowack’s eye. Mickey sits, a pained expression on his face, and Ian almost feels bad, for making the class listen to his half-finished project. “Yeah?”

Nowack adjusts his glasses, and scribbles something on his notepad. “See me after class.”

Ian blinks, fists clenching with disappointment. “You have any comments?”

Nowack stares back at him, pen poised over the notepad. “You heard what I said, yes?”

Ian glances over at Mickey, who chews on his lip and stays obstinately quiet. “Yeah,” Ian says, gathering his music. “Alright.”

He returns to his seat, head dropping into his hands tiredly.

“Hey, it’s alright,” Malone whispers. “You barely had a week.”

Ian looks over at him with a strained smile and a nod, as the next student makes their way to the front.

He sucks in a breath, and fights the sting of frustration in his eyes. It isn’t that he turns his nose up at the prospect of learning what he has yet to master. He wants to grow. He wants to understand what everyone around him seems to have all figured out, but he always seems about three steps behind. He thought this would be a place to shine. Thought maybe he had his future figured out, when he came here.

He just wishes he could have a fucking chance to show that he deserves to be here, in his own way.

The class seems to drag on, every new performance another pang of wistful envy in Ian’s chest, until finally, Nowack dismisses them, and Malone tosses him a sympathetic smile.

“Good luck,” he offers, pulling his bag over his shoulder and hurrying out with the rest of the class.

Ian swallows, feeling his anxiety swell as the class drains.

“Mikhailo?” Nowack calls, causing the TA to pause, classroom door halfway open. “Come back here.”

Mickey’s gaze flits longingly out to the hallway. “It’s...lunch.”

Out of all the things Mickey has said thus far, that is the one statement that Ian can fully get behind.

Nowack stares patiently, and Mickey wilts away from the door, lowering his eyes as he begrudgingly backtracks to the front of the classroom.

Nowack returns his attention to Ian, and his pulse doubles in volume, against his will.

“Mr. Gallagher,” Nowack intones, adjusting his glasses as Mickey comes to a halt beside him. “The school board obviously saw something in you, when you are composing your own music. However, in my class, you must learn to master the classics before you venture into uncharted territory. So, I would like you to accept private lessons.”

Ian relaxes ever-so-slightly at the announcement. Private lessons? He’d kill for private lessons from an esteemed pianist, and here said pianist is, offering him private lessons like it’s a pill to swallow.

“I think that’s a great idea,” Ian says carefully, glancing uneasily over at Mickey, who looks at Nowack with a questioning eye.

“Mikhailo,” Nowack begins, turning to the TA, who raises an eyebrow. “You will be his tutor.”

“What?”

They say it at the same time, with the same tone of disbelief and slight disgust.

“I don’t fuckin’ have time for that,” Mickey protests. “He’s hopeless. He’s way behind where he needs to be.” Ian glares at him, and he glances over, with a shrug. “No offense, man.”

Ian scoffs. “Fuck you.”

“Nowack,” Mickey pleads, ignoring Ian. “I’m takin’ twenty-one credits this semester, workin’ a job, _and_ I’m servin’ this probation bullshit. Don’t make me do this, too.”

Ian opens his mouth, to object, to say that he doesn’t fucking want hot-headed, filterless, Chicago-infested Mickey Milkovich to be his tutor. But something burrows into his mind, like a sudden jolt of static, to remind him that this is also talented, hard-working, take-no-shit Mickey Milkovich.

Maybe not the worst candidate to get him up to par with his classmates, quick.

“Alright,” he says. “I’m willing.”

Mickey’s eyebrows draw together. “That’s great. Did you not hear me say I don’t want shit to do with it, like, three seconds ago?”

“Mikhailo,” Nowack begins, in a warning tone.

“No,” Mickey cuts him off, holding up a finger. “You can’t keep pilin’ shit on me just because you can’t be bothered, Nowack. I ain’t just your TA, I’m tryin’ to graduate on time, too.”

“It could speed along your probation,” Nowack offers. “It would look good on a resumé too, yes?”

Ian looks back at Mickey. “I would really appreciate it, man.”

Mickey stands, quiet, chewing his lip in thought, eyes flitting between Ian and Nowack, before he shakes his head. “Nah. No. I don’t have time, I don’t have energy. Tutor him yourself.” He turns, then, unaware of the sinking in Ian’s chest, and he pushes through the classroom door without a second glance.

Ian stares over at Nowack hopelessly. “Can’t you just make him do it?”

“He is not a slave. I cannot _make_ him do anything, Mr. Gallagher.” Nowack rubs a hand over his face tiredly. “I suppose I will have to find you someone else, then.”

“Well, thank you,” Ian sighs, looking to the floor. “I know today wasn’t...good.”

Nowack barks out a laugh. “You are not a unique case. I understand your situation. You lack training. But I saw your audition tape, after we spoke that first class. And I think you are a hard worker. Interested in feedback. I do have hope for you, Ian.”

Ian’s attention snaps up to Nowack at the sound of his first name, and he fights back a smile at the mild praise. “I do want to learn. I worked on that piece until my fingers nearly bled.”

Nowack shrugs. “So, next time, you work until they do bleed. And then you keep going. Until the keys are red, yes?”

Ian nods, and Nowack dismisses him with a wave of his hand.

He leaves the classroom feeling lighter than he has in days. Optimistic. Looking onward, to a night out, to his career, to taking his frustration and pushing himself harder, to new heights, with this flood of fresh opportunity.

Until the damn keys are red.

* * *

 

Mickey shoves his hands into his pockets, hunching his shoulders and focusing on the warmth in his core, willing it to spread to his ligaments, to flush out the night chill. He swallows down the faint hum of crooning jazz spilling from the bar behind him, and turns his head to trace the shape of the streetlight to his left as a group of well-dressed, laughing men filters through the entrance. The outline of his pack of cigarettes echoes against his skin, and he thinks back, to the beginning of the year, when he had gone to a New Year’s party and had decided to tell people that his resolution was to quit smoking.

The wind shifts his way, and he catches a puff of secondhand smoke, from some other street corner, from some other resolution-breaker. He pulls the pack from his pocket seconds later, and balances a cigarette between his teeth.

Fuck it. All the best artists die young.

“Mickey?”

A distant voice sends him blinking back to the street, and he pulls the unlit smoke from his mouth as his date approaches, flashing a bleached smile through a thick beard.

Mickey nods shortly. “Hey.”

Ted comes to a stop a few feet in front of him, crossing his arms. “Hey. I wasn’t sure you’d show.”

Mickey shrugs, running his thumb lightly over the tip of the cigarette. “Needed a break from schoolwork. Got an essay due the second fuckin’ week of school.”

“Happy to be your distraction,” Ted grins.

“So, the fuck is this place?” Mickey asks, jerking his head back towards the bar.

“You’ll see,” Ted says, cryptically, motioning to the entrance. “Ready?”

Mickey squints at him, mourning the unlit cigarette between his fingers, before tucking it back into his pocket and nodding, following Ted into the bar.

Dimly lit, the bar is filled with sleek, round, glass-topped tables, all much taller than they need to be. An elevated platform at the center of the bar boasts a grand piano, behind which a small woman with neat dreadlocks plays smooth, indistinguishable lounge music.

“It’s an improv lounge,” Ted explains as they find a seat at a table close to the bar. “Anyone’s allowed to play, as long as it’s an original. Thought you might want to try.”

Mickey barks out a laugh at that, leaning back in his chair. “I, uh, don’t write my own stuff. Wish I could, but, you know...ain’t my area of expertise.”

Ted’s face drops the slightest bit, his hands coming together as he rings them nervously. “Oh. I’m sorry, I had no idea.”

“It’s fine, man. I’m a classical concert pianist. So, I agonize over a bunch of old bullshit and try to make people care about it again,” Mickey explains with a smile. “I’m, like, a glorified, one-man cover band.”

The girl playing seems to grow bored, quickly resolving her piece with an inversion of the starting key’s root chord, and she gets up, earning scattered applause across the lounge. A man stands on the other side of the room, replacing her and announcing that his name is Thomas Gunn, and he has been playing jazz piano for thirty five years. He then starts in on his own piece, that sounds nearly identical to what was just played.

“I’m sure you’re great,” Ted comments.

“Damn straight I’m great,” Mickey responds as a waitress approaches their table. “I’ve been playing since I was six.”

Ted smiles at the waitress, who quietly accepts their drink orders and disappears into the scenery. “Did you grow up in Brooklyn?”

“Do I sound like I grew up in Brooklyn?” Mickey asks over the lip of his beer.

Ted shakes his head, gripping his glass of scotch. “Never know. I grew up in Georgia, but I don’t sound it.”

Mickey chews his lip, and sets his beer down with a clink. “I’m from Chicago.”

“Ah,” Ted responds, with a broad nod. “Yeah. Now that you say that--yeah, alright.”

Mickey watches him with mild curiosity as the man at the piano, Thomas, ends his piece and receives mild applause. “The fuck is that supposed to mean?” he questions, lightly, as someone trades places with Thomas, out of the corner of his eye.

“I just knew there was something really distinct about your accent, but I couldn’t quite put my finger--”

The sound of a throat being cleared, coming from whoever is behind the piano, cuts Ted off briefly, attracting Mickey’s attention as he takes another sip of beer.

A sip of beer that he promptly nearly spits out, when he lays eyes on the next performer: a smiling, starry-eyed Ian Gallagher.

“Christ,” Mickey groans out under his breath.

If he didn’t know better, he’d think this kid was stalking him.

“Everything alright?” Ted asks.

Mickey rubs his temple with one hand, glancing up at the guy’s concerned expression. “Yeah. I just know the guy behind the piano.”

Ted’s eyebrows shoot up with interest. “Ex-boyfriend?”

Mickey’s mouth drops open, preparing a violent refusal, when Ian finally speaks, the crowd quieting a bit.

“Um, hi, everyone. My name is Ian. I just started...at Juilliard.” He pauses, as he receives a few, scattered shouts of approval, _not_ including Mickey. “And I’m going to play something a bit less jazzy.” He smiles, fingers dancing silently on the keys already. “Feel free to boo me preemptively.” A laugh ripples through the crowd, accompanied by a few claps. He waits for the calm before he speaks again. “I’ve really been inspired, lately, by Frederic Chopin, and Claude Debussy. So let’s see…” He glances down at his hands, and seems to place them more deliberately. “Let’s see if I can... _channel_ them both right now.”

The crowd goes quiet with interest, much quieter than before, and Mickey finds it utterly irritating.

What can be so fucking special about an improvisational piece? And where was this calm, collected, borderline cocky attitude this morning, during his evaluation?

Ian starts, then, after an exhale, hitting a low octave in his left hand, to signal a deeply minor key (the Chopin, Mickey supposes), and then floats his right hand down an easy, half-chromatic lament.

Pretty. Nothing incredible.

He continues with the withholding exposition, taking his time in just the right places, before relocating his right hand above the clef, singing out a song of intensity, momentum, thumb rapid in its repetition and melody precise.

It isn’t until he employs his left hand, in a sweeping, impossible arpeggio, right hand sinking into a lament, something heart-wrenching and angry and obsessive, that it clicks in Mickey’s mind.

This is not a rehearsed piece. Not something agonized over, deduced to a painful science. This is not meticulous, measure-by-measure infatuation. This is improvisation. This is easy, unfiltered creativity. This is a story, a real story, as if it’s being told by word of mouth.

Ian Gallagher, can’t-play-Mozart, barely-had-a-lesson Ian Gallagher, is a fucking virtuoso. And just this morning, Mickey refused the chance to take credit for his breakthrough into classical performance. Had called him hopeless.

He was wrong. Ian isn’t hopeless; he’s disproportionate. Anyone with this much natural talent is, in some way or another.

“Hey, I need to make a call real quick,” Mickey informs Ted distantly as he pushes away from the table, eyes not leaving Ian’s hunched form as his fingers dance over the keys at a blinding speed. He pushes through the lounge, catching Ian’s dimly lit profile as he reaches the door. The redhead squints, so narrowly that his eyes are nearly shut, expression completely swept away in the raw energy.

Mickey hurries out the door after only a moment’s hesitation, nearly tearing his phone from his pocket and unlocking it, finding Nowack’s number and pressing call.

The phone rings four times, the sound of Ian’s playing escalating inside, and something stings in Mickey’s chest when he realizes he’s missing what has to be the best piece of improvisational work he’s heard in his life.

“Mikhailo, it is nearly midnight--”

“I’ll do it,” Mickey says, cutting off Nowack’s sleep-slurred berating.

There’s a pause, and some muted shuffling. “What?”

“I’ll do it. I’ll tutor the Gallagher kid,” Mickey explains.

“Oh. Fantastic.”

Mickey kicks a piece of gravel with his foot, as the piece distantly sinks into a softer, B section. “Yeah.”

“Might I ask what sparked this change of heart?”

Mickey shrugs, focusing on the dull shine of the streetlight on the pavement. “Anything to get off probation.”

He hangs up, sparing the old man another second of half-conscious conversation, and steps back into the club just as Ian transitions into what must be the final section.

The light casts a soft, red glare on the stage, intensifying the drama, and Mickey stands, struck by his own rash decision, as he watches the boy he once knew smolder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [this video is what ian was playing in my head ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JIiOgJWlcs)  
>  i'm aware that everything seems rushed but this all feels like the exposition to the bigger plot points so idk  
> [gll-vch.tumblr.com](https://gll-vch.tumblr.com)


End file.
